The Rudolf Steiner Archive

How can one approach the Christ impulse, how does one come near the Being of Christ? In one form or another this question is asked again and again—and rightly so. People feel a need to ask this all-important question which must be approached from many aspects as we have done in our anthroposophical studies. Just as a photograph of a tree taken from one angle does not convey its full shape, so one aspect or indeed several do not exhaust the many-sidedness of a spiritual reality. All we can hope is that we shall come near it by approaching it from as many aspects as possible.

It is essential to realize that seeking Christ is deeply connected with the nature of the human ‘I’ and is therefore something inward and intimate. The special nature of the human ‘I’ comes to expression in the way we use the word ‘I.’ All other words are applicable to other things whereas the word ‘I’ can never refer to anything except to the one who speaks it. Because of the inner relationship between the Being of Christ and the human ‘I’ the Christ Being has for us the same intimate character as our own ‘I.’ All the impulses of feeling and will which stir within us when we contemplate the Mystery of Christ are actual means by which we draw near the Christ. It is through feeling- and will-filled contemplation of Christ that we have reason to hope we may find Him. At present it is of particular importance to pay attention to mankind's historical evolution especially in relation to the Event of Christ. Historically, the present is a significant moment in time. Few are aware of its full implication; it is therefore all the more important to be mindful of man's historical development in relation to every issue of significance.

We know that man's inner development, the whole configuration of his soul life was different before and after the Mystery of Golgotha. Various aspects of this difference have already been described. Some fifty or sixty years ago there was more feeling for spiritual knowledge, more people concerned themselves with higher questions. The inclination to do so has since waned. To illustrate this we can turn to the writings of a psychologist such as Fortlage¹⁷ who, up to the sixties of the 19th Century practiced in Jena and other cities. We still find in his writings a remarkable description of human consciousness to which, I may add, modern philosophers take great exception.

Fortlage said, in (1869), that human consciousness is related to death, to dying, and as we, in the course of life, develop consciousness we are actually slowly and gradually developing those forces which, at the moment of death, confront us all of a sudden. In other words Fortlage sees the moment of death as an immensely enhanced act of consciousness. One could say that he sees consciousness as life which gradually develops into death. It is not life as such which develops death, but the consciousness in man develops death forces and death itself is enhanced consciousness compressed into a moment. This statement by a psychologist—condemned as I said by modern philosophers as unscientific—is immensely significant.

It is important to realize that despite the significance of this statement in relation to man's present soul life, that is his present consciousness, it is not true for every period of man's evolution. If we go back thousands of years before the Mystery of Golgotha no one with deeper insight would have spoken like that. Our present consciousness, which is normally devoid of all former atavistic clairvoyance, does owe its existence to slow death. But this was not the case at the time of the ancient atavistic clairvoyant consciousness which disappeared as the time of the Mystery of Golgotha approached. Words are always inadequate for describing such matters. Nevertheless it can be said that this ancient consciousness was engendered by a surplus of spiritual life over man's organic life. Now we find ourselves within a surplus of organic life which is gradually dying. Our consciousness at present is due to the fact that, in returning to the body upon waking, we are overwhelmed by a body which is subject to death, which is progressively dying. The fact that we are overwhelmed by it enables us to develop our present day-consciousness which is an object consciousness.

In ancient times before the Mystery of Golgotha things were different. Man then had a surplus of spiritual life which was not altogether extinguished when, on waking, he returned to the body. This surplus of spiritual life expressed itself as atavistic clairvoyance. But as the time of the Mystery of Golgotha approached this surplus decreased ever more. At the time of the Mystery of Golgotha, in the case of most people, a balance had been reached between man's inner life of soul and the organic life of his body. After the Mystery of Golgotha the organic life gradually gained the upper hand. One can also express it by saying that before the Mystery of Golgotha man gained knowledge through the forces of birth; after the Mystery of Golgotha he gains knowledge through the forces of death. This again illustrates the significance of the Mystery of Golgotha as the turning point in human evolution.

The ancient clairvoyant consciousness; i.e., the consciousness related to birth began to wane. Slowly and gradually man lost the spiritual world from his consciousness. Whereas formerly everyone was able to experience the spiritual world a time began, about a thousand years before the Mystery of Golgotha, when gradually only those who were initiated in the Mysteries were able to do so. This explains a remark made by Plato, referred to in my book Christianity as Mystical Fact. Plato who knew of this secret, declared that only those initiated in the Mysteries were humans in the true sense, all others were souls submerged in mire.—Rather a horrible statement but not an arbitrary one: it refers to the situation I have just described which arose out of necessity in human evolution.

Let us for a moment imagine what would have happened had the Mystery of Golgotha not taken place: Evolution would have continued the way it was before, which means that more and more human beings on the earth would lose all direct connection with the spiritual world. Eventually humanity would no longer be able to incorporate the spirit; man's body would become larva-like consisting only of organic and etheric members. A long time ago men's souls would have been incapable of living in the bodies available; they would have hovered above them in the spiritual world. Only those souls who, in an earlier epoch had reached higher development, would be able to inspire their bodies from above. Consciousness of the spiritual world would have been possible only in the case of individuals receiving inspiration in the Mysteries. The human spirit itself would not inhabit the earth. In the mystery centers it would be possible to receive inspiration but Ahriman would battle against this. He would distort the inspirations thus preventing the larva-like human bodies from carrying out what was intended.

Because the human body, during its life between birth and death, overcomes a now comparatively weaker life of soul, it had to be made possible for the human soul to live again in a body which is subject to birth and death. This became possible only because a Being from the spiritual world, the Christ Being, united Himself with those earthly forces which came to dominate man's consciousness. What kind of forces are they? They are death forces, the very forces to which man now owes his consciousness! You will understand the far-reaching meaning of the Rosicrucian saying: In Christo Morimur, in Christ we die. These words express in a sense the very meaning of man's existence. They express what entered human evolution through the Mystery of Golgotha. They express what united itself with the death-bringing forces enabling them to become henceforth the basis for man's consciousness.

It may be asked why in these circumstances such a great number of people still do not acknowledge the Christ? All one can say about this is that so many and so far-reaching secrets are connected with this question that at present it is not yet possible to speak about them in a general way. But what I have just described is a fact of human evolution.

Let us now connect what has been said with the Mystery of Golgotha: Christ had incarnated in the body of Jesus of Nazareth; i.e., in a body subject to the same conditions as those to which human bodies in general were subject at that time. As a result of the pure hereditary conditions the body of Jesus of Nazareth was subject to conditions in which consciousness was gradually to emerge from the forces of death. What had to happen to give evolution so mighty a jolt that it would cause an equally mighty impulse to stream as a force into mankind's evolution, making consciousness arise from forces of death? The Christ-being, that lived for three years in and through the body of Jesus of Nazareth, spoke the secrets connected with human consciousness to this body. This could be done only at the moment of death, for it is only then that the entire secret connected with human consciousness is drawn together. Did not the Christ have to lead Jesus through death in order that this whole impulse of consciousness could stream into mankind? Indeed, it did! And death is also that moment when we too may hope to attain an intensified comprehension of Christ. This is because at that moment all the forces are present which have sustained our consciousness throughout life. We are adapted at the moment of death to absorb what is in fact the secret of our consciousness and to absorb with it the Christ Impulse. We are preparing ourselves to receive it when we seek not only to understand but to experience the reality of the Christ Impulse. However what meets us at death we can understand only when our organ for understanding is set free. That means that while the moment of death does indeed provide the condition for union with Christ, it is only when we are free of the etheric body that the astral body and ‘I’—the organization for understanding—can actually perceive this union.

Something else had to take place at the Mystery of Golgotha to bring about these conditions: After Christ had—in dying on Golgotha—entrusted to Jesus as it were the secrets of man's future consciousness, a momentous event had to occur: Jesus, in whom the Christ dwelt, rose to new life through the force of death. In other words, the Resurrection had to occur in order that we could understand that Resurrection when, a few days after death, we experience our ether body separating from us as explained by anthroposophical science. In this more inward death—i.e., the separation from the ether body a few days after death—we relive in a certain sense the Mystery of Golgotha. For it was life, that is, consciousness, which rose out of death: a living consciousness. At no time before the Mystery of Golgotha had this ever happened; life had always risen from life. Never before had there been a necessity to understand how life can come from death, only how life comes from life.—This is one of many approaches to the Mystery of Golgotha.

The fundamental issue of Christianity is the Resurrection. Anything calling itself by that name without having as its center a living concept of the Resurrection is no true Christianity. It is absolutely essential to understand that Christ, who united Himself with the forces of death, is the living Christ. Nothing else provides a true understanding of Christianity. Modern so-called Christianity which avoids the concept of the Resurrection is not Christianity. The essential need in mankind's evolution was the Death and Resurrection. The other events which took place at the Mystery of Golgotha are all an integral part of what has just been described.

One thought which is always problematic concerns the circumstances which led to the death of Christ Jesus.—I have often touched on this problem—on the one hand there is the feeling that the people must be condemned who brought death upon someone without sin, on the other there is the fact that if this death had not occurred Christianity would not exist. This means that Christianity with all its values has come into existence through a misdeed. The contradictory thought constantly forces itself upon man: If there had been no one criminal enough to put Christ to death there would be no Christianity. Yet we need Christianity!

Here we are touching on one of those issues in relation to which appeal must be made to understand what I recently termed “iron necessity.” During his earthly life man's thinking is adapted to the way he looks at things and he arranges life accordingly. All civic, political and other arrangements are based on human views. We live as a matter of course in conditions created by human beings, unconcerned as to whether the thoughts on which these arrangements are based come from God or from the devil. Whereas if we look back to conditions, as they generally were a long time before the Mystery of Golgotha, we find that in those ancient times man's thoughts, concerned with social arrangements, were received through atavistic clairvoyance. As we have seen, when the time of the Mystery of Golgotha drew near, man's body became more and more larva-like and as a consequence more and more accessible to ahrimanic influences. Therefore social and political institutions become more and more saturated with ahrimanic forces. It was inevitable for instance that the code of law should eventually become as it is now. It was also inevitable that an ahrimanic code of law should be particularly in evidence and concentrated, so to speak, at one particular spot on the earth at the time of the Mystery of Golgotha. Such circumstances did not prevail everywhere, but in one place the social structure was completely ahrimanic. Therefore the appearance of its very antithesis, the appearance of a God was for this society the most hateful thing that could happen, it had to be eliminated. This phenomenon, of necessity, accompanies all the others connected with the Mystery of Golgotha.

Two things in particular brought about this social structure. First, the kind of thoughts that had evolved out of Judaic law, were so saturated with ahrimanic forces that by means of them there was no possibility of grasping the fact that a God could come so close to man as was the case of Christ Jesus. This was something Judaic law had of necessity to reject. Secondly, the Romans were also responsible for the death of Christ Jesus; they were a powerful and efficient force in establishing the external side of the social structure. One cannot imagine a more powerful example than the social structure created by Roman Imperialism, particularly at the time of the Mystery of Golgotha. Yet at the moment the Mystery of Golgotha is enacted, Pilate, the representative of the strongest earthly power, proves a weakling when faced with spiritual power. He is incapable of coming to any insight or to make any decision about what is to happen.

So you see this is also a phenomenon connected with the Mystery of Golgotha—I have mentioned it before—that it took place at a time when mankind was least able to understand. In ancient times it would have been understood, but when it actually happened it was not. It must be realized that to understand this event a different approach is necessary.

One comes to realize that one must bring to the Mystery of Golgotha all the depths of one's thoughts and feelings; for example when one attempts to relate the Mystery of Golgotha to the secrets of human death and man's subsequent awakening in the astral body and ‘I.’ It is through thoughts, through contemplation that one draws near to this Mystery. It is of no use to express through empty words a general wish to reach union with Christ; what is needed is a concrete understanding of what the actual appearance of Christ in earth evolution means for one's own life. It is not without meaning that the same time span elapsed between the death and the resurrection of Christ Jesus as the one that elapses between our leaving the physical body and our leaving the ether body in death. There is an intimate bond between Christ's life on earth and the man of today living after the Mystery of Golgotha. It is now possible to say with greatest conviction: Christ came in order that man should not be lost to the earth. Had the Mystery of Golgotha not taken place man's body would have become larva-like, directed from above by his soul. Death would gradually have removed man from the earth altogether. Through the Mystery of Golgotha man's connection with the earth was restored. Through the Mystery of Golgotha the possibility of consciousness arising from death was created.

These things can be understood today, they are revealed to contemplation of the spiritual world; making them our own deepens our inner life. When we are faced with crucial events we are not helped by knowing in a general way that we are connected with something called “the Christ,” whereas our inner life is deepened and strengthened when we know quite concretely that we are intimately connected with that Being who actually experienced earthly life and went through the Mystery of Golgotha. In contemplating these things we feel our innermost being intimately connected with the historical events of Golgotha.

At the present time man is going through a crisis as far as understanding the Mystery of Golgotha is concerned. Last week I attempted to illustrate this crisis by means of a specific example. I wanted to show how a human being may make a thorough study of Christianity yet fail to find Christ. At present it is possible to belong to established Christian communities, perhaps to one which at present has an ever-increasing influence, without approaching Christ. This is a phenomenon which spiritual science must emphasize again and again. What must also be emphasized is that it is modern man's task to call up the inner forces of his soul which enables him to grasp spiritual-scientific thoughts. A certain power of soul must be called upon in order to make these thoughts inwardly living. Unless we do we shall make no progress, for it lies in the nature of present-day man that he should call upon this soul-force. A force which ought to be used, but is not, produces sickness in some form. Illness is caused not only through lack of something but also through overabundance of something. Numerous people who appear weak are in reality strong. Paradoxical as it may seem they are strong inwardly. Many who go about like weaklings dissatisfied with life, not knowing how to be—as they put it—“in tune with the infinite” are actually strong, but subconsciously. However, they are incapable of bringing their subconscious strength into consciousness because they have no inkling of what it is that clamours for recognition within them. As a consequence the subconscious rebels and causes instability. The aim of spiritual science is to make man conscious of what is stirring within him, of what is in fact striving to become conscious. A true and satisfying understanding of the Mystery of Golgotha is what above all wants to become conscious, a fact which often expresses itself in remarkable ways.

As I have pointed out there is on the one hand a need to understand the spiritual world and on the other a shrinking away from such knowledge. Many things show that the longing is there to find again the spirit, which however, cannot be found today without an understanding of the Mystery of Golgotha. That the longing is present is often emphasized by writers who are themselves as remote as possible from any real comprehension. In order to understand present-day life we must acquaint ourselves with these matters of which there are plenty of examples in everyday life. Those who have developed interest in spiritual science have the task to recognize the spiritual knowledge which should be impartial at present; they must also be able to recognize where there is a shrinking away from such knowledge. One must especially learn to recognize where there seemingly is a striving for the spirit—which indeed there is, though unconsciously—but in a spurious form while genuine spiritual science is not approached. That is why I do not hesitate to point to such obvious examples in present-day life.

Recently I was sent another article in which the writer describes just such an example of so-called spiritual striving. Someone the writer knew well told him—the way such things are usually conveyed these days—that he simply must hear Johannes Müller¹⁸ speak. This gentleman felt that to hear Johannes Müller was an experience not to be missed. He further informed the writer that Johannes Muller is the principal of a psychiatric clinic and had founded what amounted to a new ethics, a new religion. However, at the word religion he suddenly plunged into a detailed Christology. At an incredible speed he developed his personal view of the life of Jesus after which he elaborated on liberal theology, the Warburg school of thought, and that of the Heidelburg school. He then went on to discuss Alexandrine poetry and Hegelianism and so on.—This is a prime example of the folly of many people who take an interest in whatever crops up and at the slightest opportunity reel it off at breakneck speed. The writer, listening to all this, thought no one could speak that fast except perhaps >Kainz¹⁹ and then only if he had to catch the last express train to Berlin after a theater performance. Nevertheless after this experience the writer goes to hear a lecture by Johannes Müller about the purpose of life.

Listening to this lecture the writer felt that Johannes Müller spoke about life's purpose as would a saint. The lecture dealt with how one ought to sacrifice oneself, how one should live for others, not for oneself and so on. Only one thing bothered the writer: the conversation he had with the fast-talking gentleman had led him to form a picture in his mind of Johannes Müller. He felt that if only Johannes Müller had looked like this mental picture he could have believed in him. However, Johannes Müller was nothing like what he had visualized. He describes his impression of Johannes Müller which I shall not spare you as it demonstrates how one sets about judging things nowadays. This is the writer's description: “On to the platform came a medium-sized, thick-set man with a short neck, bushy moustache, fresh complexion; the archetype of a thoroughly healthy citizen of a German provincial town. I could not avoid the idea that this man would be perfect as manager of some large toy factory in Nuremberg. The way he dealt with the audience reinforced this impression. His way of speaking was lucid, definite, friendly, calm, yet expressing strong inner participation in what he said. Everything was explained in simple terms with many repetitions and he never stopped till he had said all he wanted to say. He kept to his subject, spoke to the point and was obviously filled with earnest desire to serve the good. In short, ideally a town council should be composed of people like him. Similar things could be said about his subject; basically, Johannes Müller expressed what good German citizens would think about on special feast days.”

How does this impression compare with the writer's image of someone who spoke about self-sacrifice and living solely for others? He says: “The image I had formed of Johannes Müller had established itself so firmly in my mind that I was convinced he must be real. I had visualized someone with a pale face which he would support with a thin white hand, his sad brown eyes gazing into far distances. If this Johannes Müller had been on the platform saying in a soft voice: Believe me Ladies and Gentlemen, the purpose of life is sacrifice, then not only I, but everyone, would, at least for the moment, have had to agree.”

In other words if Johannes Müller had resembled the writer's preconceived notion the latter would have believed him. Very interesting! And why would the writer believe him? The reason is simple. This writer, unlike most people in the audience, has a critical mind. He judges with a certain shrewdness that a speaker with a pale face, liquid eyes and a melting look would have a right to speak about sacrifice. One would believe in him, for it would be clear that for such a man self-sacrifice would be the joy of his life; therefore no real sacrifice. The external appearance of Johannes Müller obviously suggested none of this. The writer said to himself: the way this man on the platform expresses himself, the way he looks makes it obvious that what he says has nothing to do with sacrifice on his part. He speaks as he does because he enjoys it, to him it is a joke.—This is of course a paradox; what the writer felt was that a man like the speaker would always do just what he wanted to do, what would give him pleasure. He would never say so, for if he did he would have to tell his audience that the purpose of life is to follow whatever impulse one happens to have, to do whatever one has an urge to do. In fact he would have to speak like Nietzsche. He does not for he would always say what is opposite to his actual inclinations.

Nowadays there is often a longing to say things which are opposite one's inclinations. Let us be quite clear about what this implies. There is no doubt that just those who are least inclined to sacrifice themselves for others are the very people who love to say that the purpose of life is self-sacrifice, to live solely for others. There is a definite wish to say what is in absolute contrast to reality.—What is that?

When life is observed with a sense for reality it is very recognizable that what people like to speak about are impulses in complete contrast to their own. They deceive themselves about it of course, but it is a most conspicuous feature of life today. There is a desire for the sensation of something which is in contrast to the reality. It must be remembered that there is at present no great understanding for these matters. There is also the fact that so many possibilities exist which help to avoid coming face to face with them. For instance someone hearing Johannes Müller say that the purpose of life is to sacrifice oneself for others might tell a lot of people how he has heard a marvelous speaker say something very illuminating: “The purpose of life is to sacrifice oneself for others” and announce that henceforth he will live by that principle according to the way he sees it. Living by such a rule the way one sees it is of course an easy way to avoid many of the more difficult demands made by life. At present it is a favorite way of doing just that; and confirms that for many people, indeed for most it is exciting to say the very opposite of what they are.

It is basically an expression of a longing many people have; they are dissatisfied with external life and want something different. There is a genuine longing to rise above external life but the longing finds unhealthy expression because people seek at all cost to avoid recognizing the reality of the spirit. Take the example of the writer I just mentioned; he will undoubtedly be suited better by Johannes Muller than by spiritual science—that is predictable. The reason is simple; Johannes Müller speaks of things like the purpose of life, of sacrificing oneself for others. This subject the writer can use for an article which he ends with the words: “What the great universal purpose of life is we shall never know, nor is it in the last resort necessary for us to know.”—Thus the writer manages to appear high-minded and worldly while remaining a thoroughly ordinary philistine.

This is impossible when one strives to attain a world view which does not rely on mere phrases but recognizes the reality of the spiritual world and what is demanded of the present age. The individual who sets out on this path will develop a sense for what the spiritual world at this moment wants from him. He will discover for himself how his development ought to progress and to what extent his particular destiny requires him to sacrifice himself for others. There is no need for any phrase to be bandied about; what is needed is the development of that inner strength which eventually leads to spiritual insight.

Nothing can be said against the meaning of a sentence such as: “The purpose of life is to sacrifice oneself for others,” but it remains a sterile phrase till one learns to bring spiritual reality into physical reality. That was the very reason why the Mystery of Golgotha was fulfilled. It entered evolution so that new life might spring from death. Or in other words, so that the living spirit might be born from our present death-related consciousness. In bringing to birth, within our death-related consciousness, the living spirit, we approach the Mystery of Golgotha.—There are indications which suggest that people are beginning to recognize the necessity of listening to what spiritual science has to say. We live in difficult times, fraught with problems and conflict. Everyone feels that it is essential to find a way out. However, it is inherent in the age that a way out can be found only through a real understanding of the spirit. All other attempts will prove illusory.

The first understanding of the Mystery of Golgotha came about through direct experience. At first people could speak of Christ because some had actually seen Him; later some had known others who had seen Him. There was still an echo of Christ's own words in those spoken by the first Apostles. Thus mankind's first experience of Christ was on the physical plane. Through the centuries this knowledge faded and had vanished altogether by the turn of the 19th and 20th Centuries. That the present situation should arise was therefore inevitable when there are people—as I described in the last lecture—who, though they want to be Christians, do not actually seek Christ. We must realize that we live in a time of crisis as far as understanding Christ is concerned. We can reach understanding appropriate to our age in no other way than through an ever-deeper understanding of spiritual science. Ahrimanic forces battle against this knowledge just because it is so essential in our time. However, this does not prevent those who recognize the task of spiritual science from seeing this task connected with the enormous world-historical events taking place in our time. The solution to today's great problems can only come from real knowledge of the present age. And it is not biased propaganda to say that only through spiritual science can a solution be found.

• 17. Arnold Rudolf Karl Fortlage 1806–1881 German Philosopher
• 18. Johannes Müller 1864–1949 German Philosopher
• 19. Josef Kainz 1858–1910 famous actor.

It is especially important in our time that the reality of spiritual life is not confused with the way people interpret this reality. We live in an age when human understanding and human conduct are strongly influenced by materialism. However, it would be wrong to think that because our age is materialistic, spiritual influences are not at hand, that the spirit is not present and active. Strange as it may seem it is possible, particularly in our time, to observe an abundance of effects in human life which are purely spiritual. They are everywhere in evidence and, the way they manifest, one could certainly not say that they are either invisible or inactive. The situation is rather that people, because of their materialistic outlook, are incapable of seeing what is manifestly there. All they see is what is so to speak "on the agenda." When one looks at people's attitude to the spirit, at the way they react when spiritual matters are spoken of, it reminds one of an incident which took place several decades ago in a Central European city. There was an important meeting of an important body of people and the degeneration of moral standards came under discussion. Immoral practices had begun to have adverse influence on certain financial transactions. Naturally a large part of this distinguished body of people wanted financial matters to be discussed purely from the point of view of finance. But a minority—it usually is a minority on such occasions—wanted to discuss the issue of moral corruption. However a minister got up and simply tossed aside such an irrelevant issue by saying: “But gentlemen, morality is not on the agenda.”—It could be said that the attitude of a great many people today in regard to spiritual matters is also one that says: But gentlemen, the spirit is not on the agenda. It is manifestly not on the agenda when things of importance are debated. But perhaps such debates do not always deal with the reality, perhaps the spirit is present, only it is not put on the agenda when human affairs are under discussion.

When one considers these things, and has opportunity to talk more intimately with people, a situation emerges which is very different from what is imagined by those who feel embarrassed by talking about things of a spiritual nature. When one comes to discuss how people got the impulse to do what they are doing one finds again and again that they decided on a project because of some prophetic vision or because of some inner impulse. As I said, if one looks at these things and is able to assess the situation, more often than not things are done because of some spiritual influence, perhaps in the form of a dream or some other kind of vision. Much more than is imagined takes place under the influence of spiritual powers and impulses which flow into the physical world from the spiritual world. People's theoretical rejection of spirituality, based on present-day outlook, does not alter the fact that significant spiritual impulses do penetrate everywhere into our world. However, they do not escape being influenced by the prevailing materialism. There has always been an influx of spiritual impulses throughout mankind's evolution and one ought not to think that this has ceased in our time. But people responded differently when there was more awareness of the existence of a spiritual world than they do in a materialistic age like ours. Let us look at a particular example.

It is extraordinarily difficult to convey to the world certain facts concerning spiritual matters, the reason being that people in general are not sufficiently prepared; they cannot formulate the appropriate concepts for receiving rightly such communications from the spiritual world. Such communications are all too easily distorted into the very opposite. Therefore it often happens, especially at present, that those who are initiated into spiritual matters must remain silent in regard to what is most essential. They must because it cannot be foreseen what might happen if certain things were imparted to someone unripe for the information. Nevertheless certain situations do often arise. On occasions, in accordance with higher laws, discussions take place about spiritual matters. When it is difficult, as it usually is at present, to discuss such things with the living it can often be all the more fruitful to discuss them with those who have died. Seldom perhaps was there a time when conscious interaction between the physical plane and the spiritual world, in which the dead are living, was so vigorous as it can be at present.

Let us assume that a discussion takes place of a kind possible only between someone with knowledge on the physical plane and someone who has died. In this situation something very curious can happen, something that could be termed a "transcendental indiscretion" can take place. The fact is that there are those who listen at keyholes, so to speak, not only on the physical plane, but also among certain beings in the spiritual world. There are spirits of an inferior kind who are forever attempting to obtain knowledge of all kinds of spiritual facts by such means. They listen to what is being said between beings on the physical plane and those in the spiritual world. Their opportunity to listen to such a conversation can arise through someone who, being especially passionate, in the grip of his passion is, as one might say, “beside himself.” This kind of situation often arises through passion, through being drunk—really physically drunk—or through faintness. It gives the lower spirit opportunity to enter into the person with the result that the person either then or later has visions of some kind and can hear things he is not supposed to hear.

It is well known to those able to observe such happenings that countless things, obtained through indiscretion in spiritual communication, appear in distorted form in all kinds of literature, particularly those of a more dubious kind. Nothing is more effective than when some lower elemental spirit (Kobold) takes possession of the writer of a detective novel, especially if drunk and, entering into his human frailties, instills in him a particular sentence or phrase which he then introduces into his story. Later the novel reaches people through all kinds of direct or indirect channels; the particular sentence has an especially strong effect because, given the way people take these things in, it speaks, not to the reader's consciousness, but to his subconscious.

Another method which is very effective is when, in a spiritualistic seance, such a spirit may have the opportunity to insinuate, into what is related through the medium, the spiritual indiscretion he wishes put to effect. This is not to say anything against mediumship as such, only the way it is used. Many things occur in the course of human karma which, in order to come to light, need mediumistic communications. We are not dealing with this aspect today, however. The point I want to make at the moment is to emphasize that there are at the present time spiritual channels between the spiritual world and the physical plane. These channels are very numerous and far more effective than is supposed.—Having said this you will understand better when I now say something which may seem paradoxical but is nevertheless a reality.

The years between 1914 and 1917 will no doubt be written about in the future in the usual way of historians. They will scrutinize documents, found in archives everywhere, in order to establish what caused the terrible World War. On this basis they will attempt to write a plausible account of say the year 1914 in relation to events in Europe. However, one thing is certain: no documentary research, no report drawn up in the way this is usually done will suffice to explain the causes of this monstrous event. The reason is simply that according to their very nature the most significant causes are not inscribed by pen or printer's ink into external documents. Furthermore their very existence is denied because they are not, so to speak, “on the agenda.”

Just in these last days you will have read reports of the legal inquiries going on in Russia. The Russian minister of war Suchomlinoff,²⁰ the Chief of the Russian General Staff and other personalities have made important statements which have caused a great deal of indignation. Many feel moral indignation on learning that Suchomlinoff lied to the Czar; or that the Chief of the Russian General Staff, with the mobilization order in his pocket, gave the German Military Attache his solemn promise that this order had not yet been issued. He said this because he intended to pass it on to the proper quarters a few minutes later. Such things are certainly cause for indignation and moralizing but so much lying goes on nowadays that no one should be surprised that really fat ones are told in important places. But these incidents and what people say about them are truly not the real issue. That is something quite different. When one reads the full report carefully one comes across remarkable words which are clear indicators of what really took place. Suchomlinoff himself says that while these events were taking place he, for a time, lost his reason. He says in so many words: “I lost my reason over it.” The continuous vacillation of events caused this state of affairs. He was not alone, quite a few others in key positions were in similar states.

Imagine a person occupying a position such as that of Suchomlinoff: The loss of his power of reasoning gives splendid opportunity for ahrimanic beings to take possession of him and instill into his soul all kinds of suggestions. Ahriman uses such methods to bring his influence to bear, especially when no importance is attached to remaining fully conscious—apart from sleep. When we are fully conscious such spiritual beings have no real access to our soul. But when our spirit; i.e., our consciousness is suppressed then ahrimanic beings have immediate access. Dimmed consciousness is for ahrimanic and luciferic beings the window or door through which they can enter the world and carry out their intention. They attack people when they are in a state of dimmed consciousness and take possession of them. Ahriman and Lucifer do not act in inexplicable terrifying ways but through human beings whose state of consciousness gives them access.

Those who in the future want to write a history of this war must discover where such dimmed states of consciousness occurred, where doors and windows were thrown open for the entry of ahrimanic and luciferic powers. In earlier times such things did not happen to the same extent in events of a similar kind. In order to describe the causes of events during earlier times what professors and historians find in archives will suffice, whereas in the case of present events something will remain unexplained over and above what is found in documents however well researched. This something is the penetration of certain spiritual powers into the human world through states of dimmed consciousness.

I spoke in an earlier lecture about how, in a certain region of the earth, conditions were prepared for decades so that at the right moment the appropriate ahrimanic forces could penetrate and influence mankind. Something of this nature took place in July and August of 1914 when an enormous flood, a veritable whirlpool, of spiritual impulses surged through Europe. That has to be rightly understood and taken into account. One simply does not understand reality if one is not prepared to approach it with concrete concepts derived from spiritual insight. To understand what is real, as opposed to what is unreal, at the present time spiritual science is an absolute necessity. Nothing can effectively be done in the political or any other sphere unless wide-awake consciousness is developed concerning events which must be approached with concepts and ideas gained from spiritual knowledge. Not that everything can be judged in stereotyped fashion according to spiritual science. But spiritual knowledge can stir us to alert participation in present issues, whereas a materialistic view of events allows us to sleep through things of greatest importance. A materialistic outlook prevents us from arriving at proper judgement of what the present asks of us.

A recognition of what here is at stake is what I so much want to be present as an undercurrent in our spiritual-scientific lectures and discussions, so that spiritual knowledge may become a vital force enabling souls to deal appropriately with outer life. It is essential to recognize not only the issues of spiritual science itself but also those of external life as they truly are. One must be able to arrive at judgements based on the symptoms to be seen everywhere.

I recently described the incredible superficiality with which a professor of Berlin University attacked Anthroposophy. I told you of the misrepresentations and slanders delivered by Max Dessoir.²¹ That such an individual should be a member of a learned body is part and parcel of the complexities of life today. Max Dessoir once wrote a history of psychology and mentions in the preface that he wrote it because the Berlin Academy of Science had offered a prize for a work on the subject. The history of psychology written by Max Dessoir is such a slovenly piece of work, containing fundamental errors that he withdrew it and prohibited further publication. Consequently not many copies are in circulation, though I have a reviewers copy and could say many things about it. For the moment I refer to it in my forth coming booklet concerned with attacks on Anthroposophy.

As I said Max Dessoir wrote a history of psychology and then withdrew it from circulation. But the fact remains that the Berlin Academy of Science did award it the prize. Such things should not be overlooked; they are symptomatic of what takes place nowadays. One must ask: who are the people who award such prizes? They are the very people who educate the younger generation; i.e., they educate those who will become leading figures in society. They also educated the generation which brought about the present situation in the world. It is necessary to see things in their true context and to recognize that all the symptoms reveal the need for that which alone can make our time comprehensible.

This again indicates what I wish so very much could flow as an undercurrent through our movement so that spiritual science would shake souls awake and make them alert observers of what really takes place in their surroundings. The occasion for sleep is in our time considerable and naturally ahrimanic and luciferic powers make use of every opportunity to divert the alert consciousness aroused by spiritual knowledge away from the real issues. The opportunities for dulling man's consciousness are plentiful. Someone who studies exclusively a special subject will certainly become ever more knowledgeable and clever in his particular field; yet the clarity of his consciousness may suffer as a result.—In speaking about these things one is skating on very thin ice.

While it is true that there are many things of which an initiate cannot speak at present because it could have terrible results, it is also true that there are things of which one can and indeed must speak. To give an example, there is a professor at a German university of whom much good could be said and I have no intention to say anything against the man. I want to give an objective characterization. He is a distinguished scholar of theology, has studied widely and his research in the domain of theology has made him very learned. Yet it has not made him awake and alert to what constitutes true reality. As professor of theology his task is to speak about religion, scripture and also about veneration and supersensible powers. This, for a modern professor of theology, is a rather uncomfortable task. Such learned men much prefer to speak about experiencing religion as such, about how it feels merely to approach the spiritual. This professor, as others like him, has a certain fear of the spiritual world, fear of defining or describing it in actual words and concepts. I have often spoken about this fear which is purely ahrimanic in origin. This professor has an inkling that he will meet Ahriman once he penetrates the material world and enters the spiritual world. He would then have to overcome Ahriman.

Here we see someone who as a theologian looks upon the beauty and the greatness of nature as a manifestation of the divine. But this aspect of nature he will not investigate for it is the beings of the Higher Hierarchies who reveal themselves through nature and to speak of them is not “scientific.” Nevertheless he does want to investigate the soul's religious experiences. However, in attempting investigation of this kind, without any wish to enter the spiritual world itself, one very easily succumbs instead to the very soul condition one is apt to experience when confronting Ahriman: the condition of fear. The religious experience of this theologian consists therefore partly of fear, of timidity in face of the unknown. The last thing he wants is to make the unknown into the known. He presumes that timidity and fear of the unknown—which stems from ahrimanic beings—is part and parcel of religious experience.

It is because he wants to describe the soul's religious experience but refuses to enter the realm of the Hierarchies who live behind the sense world that Ahriman darkens his comprehension of the spiritual world. Through the ahrimanic temptation the spiritual world appears as “the great unknown,” as “the irrational” and religious experience is confused with the “mystery of fear.”—Nor is that all, for just as Ahriman is waiting without when one seeks the spiritual world through external nature so does Lucifer wait within. The modern theologian of whom we are speaking also refuses to seek the Hierarchies within. Here again Lucifer makes the realm of the Hierarchies appear as "the great unknown" which the theologian refuses to make into the known. Yet he wants to know the soul's experience, so here he meets the opposite of the mystery of fear, namely the “mystery of fascination.” This is a realm in which we experience attraction, we become fascinated. The theologian now has on the one hand the mystery of fear and on the other the mystery of fascination; for him these two components constitute religious life.

Naturally there are critics today who feel that it is a great step forward when theology has, at last, got away from speaking about spiritual beings; no longer speaks of what is rational but about what is irrational; i.e., the mystery of fear and the mystery of fascination, the two ways to avoid entering the unknown. The book: Über das Heilige (About the Sacred) by professor Otto²² of Breslau University is certain to attain fame. This book sets out to derationalize everything to do with religious experience. It sets out to make everything vague, to make all feelings indefinite partly through fear of the unknown and also through fascination for the unknown. This view of religious life is certain to attract attention. People are bound to say that here, at last, the old fashioned idea of speaking about the spiritual world is done away with.

Anyone knowing something of Anthroposophy will recognize that in the case of this scholar there is a condition of dimmed consciousness. Such conditions frequently occur; philologists and researchers often fall into states of dimmed consciousness, especially when their investigations are within a limited field. In such conditions Ahriman and Lucifer have access to them. And why should Ahriman not prevent such a researcher from beholding the spiritual world by deluding him through the mystery of fear? And why should Lucifer not delude him through the mystery of fascination? There is no other remedy than clear awareness of the roles played by Ahriman and Lucifer, otherwise one is merely wallowing in nebulous feelings. Certainly feeling is a powerful element of the soul's life which should not be artificially suppressed by the intellect, but that is something different altogether from allowing a surge of indefinite feeling to obscure every concrete insight into the spiritual world.

One is reminded in this connection of something said by Hegel,²⁴ though it was cynical and purely speculative. Hegel was referring to Schleiermacher's²³ famous definition of religious feeling which, according to him, consisted of utter and complete dependence. This definition is not false but that is not the point. Hegel, who above all wanted to lead man to clear concepts and concrete views and certainly not to feelings of dependence, declared that if utter dependence was a criterion for being religious then a dog would be the best Christian. Similarly if fear is the criterion for religious feelings then one need only suffer an attack of hydrophobia in order to experience intensely the mystery of fear.

What I am bringing up in these lectures must be considered, not so much according to its theoretical content but rather as an indication of the kind of inner attitude which is indispensable if one wants to observe the conditions in the world as they truly are. And it is so very important to do so. No matter where or how one is placed in life one can either observe appropriately or be inappropriately asleep. What surges and pulsates through life comes to expression in small issues as well as in big ones and can be observed everywhere.

We are at the beginning of a time when it will be of particular importance that things I have indicated in these last lectures are kept very much in mind. Many people do arrive at awareness of a universal Godhead or a universal spirituality. Yet, as I demonstrated when I spoke about his article “Reason and Knowledge,” even someone of the stature of Hermann Bahr does not arrive at any real awareness of Christ. He allies himself with the most prominent Christian institution of the day, that of Rome. But despite all he says there is no sign in his “Reason and Knowledge” of any conscious search for the Christ Impulse. Yet the most pressing need in our time is to gain an ever clearer understanding of the Christ impulse.

In the course of the 19th Century there was a great upsurge of natural-scientific thinking and all its attendant results. One of the first results was theoretical materialism accompanied by atheism. It can be said that the materialists of the 19th Century positively revelled in atheism. But such tendencies are apt to reverse and the same kind of thinking which made human beings atheists—due to certain luciferic-ahrimanic impulses at work during the first upsurge of natural science—will make them pious once the first glow has faded. The teachings of Darwin can make people God-fearing as easily as it can make them atheists, it all depends which side of the coin turns up. What no one can become through Darwinism is a Christian; nor is that possible through natural science if one remains within its limits. To become a Christian something quite different is required; namely, an understanding of a certain fundamental attitude of soul. What exactly is meant?

Kant said that the world is our mental picture, for the mental pictures we make of the world are formed according to the way we are organized. I may mention, not for personal but for factual reasons, that this Kantianism is completely refuted in my books Truth and Knowledge and The Philosophy of Freedom. These works set out to show that when we form concepts about the world, and elaborate them mentally, we are not alienating ourselves from reality. We are born into a physical body to enable us to see objects through our eyes and hear them through our ears and so on. What is disclosed to us through our senses is not full reality, it is only half reality. This I also stressed in my book Riddles of Philosophy. It is just because we are organized the way we are that the world, seen through our senses, is in a certain sense what Orientals call Maya. In the activity of forming mental pictures of the world we add, by means of thoughts, that which we suppressed through the body. This is the relation between true reality and knowledge. The task of real knowledge and therefore real science is to turn half reality; i.e., semblance, into the complete reality. The world, as it first appears through our senses, is for us incomplete. This incompleteness is not due to the world but to us, and we, through our mental activity, restore it to full reality. These thoughts I venture to call Pauline thoughts in the realm of epistemology. For it is truly nothing else than carrying into the realm of philosophic epistemology, the Pauline epistemology that man, when he came into the world through the first Adam, beheld an inferior aspect of the world; its true form he would experience only in what he will become through Christ.

The introduction of theological formulae into epistemology is not the point; what matters is the kind of thinking employed. I venture to say that, though my Truth and Knowledge and The Philosophy of Freedom are philosophic works, the Pauline spirit lives in them. A bridge can be built from this philosophy to the Christ Spirit; just as a bridge can be built from natural science to the Father Spirit. By means of natural-scientific thinking the Christ Spirit cannot be attained. Consequently as long as Kantianism prevails in philosophy, representing as it does a viewpoint that belongs to pre-Christian times, philosophy will continue to cloud the issue of Christianity.

So you see that everything that happens, everything that is done in the world must be observed and understood on a deeper level. It is necessary, when assessing literary works today, to keep in view not only their verbal content but also the whole direction of the ideas employed. One must be able to evaluate what is fruitful in such works and what must be superceded. Then one will also find entry into those spheres which alone enables one to stay awake in the true sense. The terrible events taking place in our time must be seen as external symptoms, the real change of direction must start from within.

Let me mention in conclusion that before 1914 I pointed out how confused were the statements made by Woodrow Wilson.²⁵ At that time I was completely alone in that view. What I said can be found in a course of lectures I gave at Helsingfors in May and June 1913. At that time Woodrow Wilson had the literary world at his feet. Only certain writings of his had been translated into other languages and much was said about his “great, noble and unbiased” mind. Those who were of that opinion speak differently now; but whether insight or something different brought about the change of view is open to question. What is important now is to recognize that because spiritual science is directly related to true reality it enables one to form appropriate judgements. This is an urgent need in view of the empty abstraction on which most judgements are based at present. An example of the latter is Der Geistgehalt dieses Krieges (The Spiritual Import of this War) by George Simmel. It is an ingenious presentation and a prime example of ideas from which all content has been extracted. To read it is comparable to eating an orange from which all juice has been squeezed out. Yet the book was written by a distinguished philosopher and innovator of modern views. At the Berlin university he had a large following; the fact that he never had a thought worthy of the name did nothing to diminish his fame.

• 20. Wladimir Alexandrowitsch Suchomlinoff 1848–1926 Russian General
• 21. Max Dessoir 1867–1947 Philosopher and Psychologist
• 22. Rudolf Otto 1869–1937
• 24. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel 1770–1831 German Philosopher
• 23. Friedrich Schleiermacher 1768–1834 Theologian and Philosopher
• 25. Woodrow Wilson 1856–1924 Professor of Philosophy, President of the U.S.A. 1913–1921

When spiritual science investigates mankind's evolution it arrives at results which in many respects differ considerably from those presented by natural science. This applies more especially to the human soul. The view obtained through spiritual knowledge of the human soul's evolution during hundreds and thousands of years differs from the view that is possible merely through natural-scientific investigation. Looking back into earlier ages we recognize that man once possessed atavistic clairvoyance and that this made his consciousness different from what it is today. However, we must also recognize that a residue of this clairvoyance persisted right into later centuries to a far greater extent than is realized. It is particularly important to be aware of the fact that right up to the 14th, 15th, 16th and even into the 17th century a vestige of the ancient clairvoyance was still in evidence. Not with its former strength, it is true, but although weakened, it was clearly a remnant of the former atavistic clairvoyance and could be encountered over the greater part of the earth.

I have spoken in earlier lectures of the fact that even today there are people who possess atavistic clairvoyance. The reason not much is known about it is because people are usually too embarrassed to confess to their fellow men that revelations from spiritual realms enter their consciousness. I described some instances of this kind in the last lecture. However, the difference is very great between what people could still experience directly from the spiritual world in the 16th and 17th centuries and what is possible since then. And even in the 17th century most people would not have been able to describe what appeared to their clairvoyant vision to the extent of being able to say that they had seen such and such a being. Their consciousness in spiritual experiences was not strong enough to grasp the situation sufficiently to form mental pictures of it. But though the consciousness was subdued, spiritual beings did still enter into man's will, into his feeling and also into his conceptual life. This was the case to a far greater extent than is imagined today. At the present time it is really extraordinarily difficult for someone who is able to look into the spiritual world and is conversant with the nature of what is to be experienced there, to speak freely about it to his fellow men. As I have often mentioned, one's contemporaries would receive too great a shock were one to describe certain, even elementary, facts concerning man's relationship to the spiritual world. Naturally it can cause clashes of views when an initiate, from his knowledge of the spiritual world, is obliged to say the very opposite to what his contemporaries, owing to their materialistic convictions, can accept as truth.

This situation had not yet arisen in the 14th, 15th, 16th or even 17th centuries. Much of the literature from this period is interpreted quite wrongly. This is not only because modern people think they know better than their predecessors, they also no longer understand their attitude to life. This fact comes to expression in curious ways. For example it is quite extraordinary to witness the way modern philosophers, in their writings or when lecturing, castigate the Scholastics of the Middle Ages. They go out of their way to demonstrate how far they themselves have advanced beyond i what they see as prejudiced, pedantic and narrow ideas of the Scholastics. But in truth, compared to the Scholastics, the modern philosophers are incredibly ignorant and they completely misunderstand the Scholastics. What is not realized is that at the time of Thomism, when a philosopher was engaged in the subtle art of ideation, of defining and elaborating the finer points, he was in contact with the spiritual world. It must be realized that for example Thomas Aquinas,²⁶ in the 13th Century, attained the concepts and ideas he elaborated in his writings in a completely different way from the way ideas are acquired today. One must think of his books as being inspired by a spirit from the Hierarchy of the Angeloi and that he recorded what came from a higher consciousness.

A modern philosopher would find dreadful the idea of having to sit down and wait till his Angel inspired him before writing what he was to communicate to the world; that with his Angel by his side he was to be the mouthpiece, the physical human mediator for what the Angel proclaimed concerning a higher world. Yet in no other way is it possible to understand what is coming into being, what is becoming. What I am now saying is of the greatest importance and I beg you to take special note of it. Only by listening to what is inspired into us or vouchsafed through Imagination can we come to understand what is coming into being. In our ordinary consciousness, since the 16th, 17th but especially since the 18th century, we have no relationship whatever to what is evolving, coming into existence. We look directly at things, but how much of what we see do we take into our consciousness? Let us say we look at a blossoming rose; in no instance, at no moment do we see the actual coming-into-being of the rose. From the formation of the seed to the extinction of the rose what we see is the dying, the fading away. That we see the red rose at all is due to the fact that we grasp its dying aspect. The coming-into-being aspect of things can be grasped only if one is able to listen to higher beings or receive impressions from them. No one, except higher beings who at present do not incarnate in a physical body, can perceive the becoming of the rose. In the very lowest realm of perception, the subjective light, which is almost as dull as the old clairvoyance was and, when it occurs, still is, do we see something of the becoming of the rose. But not when we look at it with physical eyes and grasp what we see conceptually.

This illustrates that an essential characteristic of our materialistic age is that only what is dying, what is going towards extinction, enters our consciousness. That was not the case at the time of the Scholastics nor even in the 17th century.

In the early part of the 17th century a little-known philosopher, Henry More,²⁷ born 1614, lived in England. When we look at his external life we see him as a living proof that man does not develop his individuality from inherited qualities alone. He brings with him characteristics, not found in parents or earlier ancestors, from former lives on earth. Henry More's parents and relations were all strict orthodox Calvinists, but already as a small boy he fought Zwingli's rigid teaching of predestination. Henry More rejected it emphatically although no one in his environment maintained anything contrary to this rigid doctrine. He had also another distinguishing characteristic. When one studies his writings, which are very interesting, one discovers the remarkable fact that he spoke of the inner presence of the spiritual world in human consciousness quite differently from the way people spoke of it later. He was a philosopher of the 17th century yet he knew that only through a more receptive consciousness than the ordinary one which only grasps the dying aspect, can man unite with that living reality which expresses itself in inspired consciousness as processes of becoming. In such inspired consciousness man can know about the processes of becoming whereas otherwise he can know only about what is connected with processes of dying. What is perceived everywhere through present-day consciousness is the dying aspects of things and even Henry More was not altogether clear that he had communed with spiritual beings. When he attempted to grasp his experiences in conceptual form; i.e. form mental pictures of them, these pictures would vanish in the very process of forming them just like a dream vanishes as we wake up. Thus he could not bring his experience of meeting spiritual beings into clear consciousness; he would forget as we forget a dream. Only dimly was he aware of their presence in his inner life but the effect of these experiences remained with him.

A very interesting thought, well known to us, was expressed also by Henry More. The thought that if one wants to reach certain higher knowledge one must learn to regard one's whole being as a member of a higher organism. Just as a finger is a member of the hand and loses its existence if separated from the hand, so too is man nothing, if torn out of his organic connection with the whole cosmos. With the finger this is more obvious. However if the finger could walk freely over our body it might well also succumb to the illusion of being an independent organism. Certainly the earth is there for man, but man is equally, in the adjoining spiritual world, a member of the greater organism of the earth. Man cannot tear himself out of this connection anymore than the finger can tear itself from the hand. I have often expressed this thought as an antidote to man's misplaced and all too prevalent conceit. In Henry More it rose as a sudden revelation. The reason was because he did have a dim knowledge, like a half-forgotten dream, of man's interconnection with the whole cosmos although he could not bring it into conscious conceptual form.

When one tries to discover what helped Henry More to formulate what lived so beautifully in his soul one finds that he had been deeply impressed by a certain booklet. This small book: the “Theologia Germanica” had also made a great impression on someone else; namely Luther²⁸ who made it available to wider circles in Germany. Henry More became a student of the “Theologia Germanica” by “the man from Frankfurth.” You will find more on this subject in my book “Mysticism at the Dawn of the Modern Age.”

The question may have arisen in your mind why it should be that in the 13th, 14th, 15th, 16th and even 17th centuries people appear who know of the spiritual world through direct communion. The reason is the following: Those who in these centuries knew most about man's connection with the spiritual world had been on earth, if not in their last incarnation then as a rule in the last but one, at a time when preparation for Christianity was being made in the secret schools, in the Mysteries. Individuals such as Henry More were present on earth in the centuries prior to the Mystery of Golgotha. They then had an intermediate incarnation in the 7th, 8th or 9th century but this later incarnation had much less impact on them than that received in the previous one from the teaching in the mysteries. These teachings, preparing for the Mystery of Golgotha, made a deeper, more intense, impression on their soul. That is why so much of great significance was said concerning Christianity during those later centuries. Through their communion with the spiritual world these individuals derived an insight into the world's coming-into-being which, since the 17th century has no longer been possible. From then onwards one had to draw ever more on external accounts alone; these accounts, however, only describe what is in the process of decline. Spiritual knowledge is needed to bring insight once more to what is in the process of becoming. The preparation for Christianity, which lasted more than half a millennium during the tragic centuries leading up to the Mystery of Golgotha, made an enormous impression on these spirits. What they carried over into the later incarnation was an impulse of feeling, an inner mood of soul which they were able to give conceptual form.

European cultural development, between the 14th and 17th centuries, takes on a deeper significance when studied with this background in mind. One comes to realize that very spiritual concepts and ideas concerning Christianity and the Bible are to be found in this period. These concepts and ideas often seem strange today because they originated from spiritual experiences. To turn his attention to the essential aspect of that period is of special interest for man today. The period between the 14th and 17th centuries is really like a mighty retrospect. Forces were still present in man's soul through which experience could arise of the surging weaving life of the spiritual world. We enter the minds of those who lived in that period when, in contemplating them, we do not forget this retrospective quality of their consciousness.

If for example we want to understand Luther it is essential to keep in mind what I have just said. Recently a very interesting book: Luther's Creed by Ricarda Huch²⁹ has appeared. The reason why the book is so interesting is mainly because it is written completely out of present-day consciousness; that it is also inadequate makes it somewhat disappointing. The periodical: “North and South” contains in the July issue an article about this book entitled: “Ricarda Huch and the Devil.” The article points out that with our consciousness as it is today we cannot really comprehend the way man's mind worked in an earlier epoch. This fact makes it all the more interesting to see how Ricarda Huch deals with Luther's belief in demons. Unlike those who, when requested for an opinion concerning Luther's belief in demons, are too cowardly to voice one, she tries to treat him fairly. Others usually dismiss the issue by saying: Well, Luther was certainly a great man but his talk about demons, his belief in the devil stemmed from the fact that he shared the general superstitions of his time.

An opinion of this kind is just about as helpful as that of the honest professor who, reading with his students what Lessing had written about a drama performance, explained that Lessing had not really been able to think through what he had written; and the professor added: “Well, if only I myself had more time!” It is through this kind of superior attitude that it is concluded that Luther had shared in the superstition of his time. The fact is that no one can understand Luther who does not realize that what, out of the spirit and consciousness of his time, was called “the devil”—we would say Ahriman and Lucifer—was for him actual spiritual experience. When he spoke of these matters at Wartburg or anywhere else it was always from direct experience. Try to compare and bring together what Luther says and you will inevitably come to the conviction that only someone who has actually seen the devil, who has met him in direct experience, can speak as Luther did. Moreover he was well aware that: “Small folk never see the devil even when he has them by the collar.” Ricarda Huch agrees, with much good will but purely theoretically, against the superior attitude of the academics who, in their cleverness, know that the devil does not exist. They conclude that Luther was superstitious as were others at his time and one must excuse and forgive the great man.

Ricarda Huch does not agree with those who hold such a superior view of great spirits of the past. However it is obvious that she has no personal experience of what the devil looks like. She does believe in him although she has never seen him; so how does she visualize the devil? She believes in his existence because she knows that there are things which neither natural science nor physiology can explain, things which must come from the devil. She too feels that some excuses must be made for Luther for she says: "One ought not to imagine that Luther believed the devil walked about the streets complete with horns and tail." However, like others, she sees what she calls the devil as a combination of certain evil traits and characteristics such as stupidity, pride, untruthfulness and so on. But these are mere abstract concepts and Ricarda Huch thought Luther used his pictorial expressions in that sense. Luther was obliged to use pictures because there is no other way to express spiritual experiences. Yet he was directly acquainted with the devil through the inner battles which unavoidably must be fought when man comes face to face with the devil.

Luther clothed his experiences in pictures in the way one otherwise clothes them in words. Only the most obtuse thinkers could possibly maintain that the words one uses to depict an event contain the event itself. Yet this is precisely the objection levelled against me by professor Dessoir when he says that I have derived the various stages of mankind's evolution, not from reality, but from mental pictures. Such things are rather prevalent; in this particular case it stems from lack of insight, from utter ignorance. In the second chapter of my forthcoming book, dealing especially with moral corruption in academic circles, you will see what kind of people are among those who teach in public places of learning. These people who help shape the present, contribute to its dreadful miseries. They also create a situation in which the Royal Academy of Science awards its prize to the shoddy history of psychology submitted by Dessoir. If you read what Dessoir's colleagues have themselves said about this slatternly superficial treatise you will get an idea of the kind of literature that circulates and even wins awards in the academic world.

Luther lived at a time when the possibility still existed to have awareness of the spiritual world. All the devilry of Ahriman he experienced directly; he could not put these experiences into ordinary words because words are designed for physical things. Spiritual experiences must be described in pictures, in Imaginations. However, Imagination does express the reality of what is perceived and experienced super-sensibly. This Ricarda Huch does not understand. She thinks that though Luther spoke of the devil one must not take it to mean that when someone with spiritual sight comes among people he will, in numerous cases, find Ahriman, hunchbacked and with horns, looking at him from where he sits firmly entrenched between their shoulders. But Luther's descriptions were based on experience, and the pictures he uses are his way of describing these experiences. His personality was not such a gentle one as that of Ricarda Huch who believes he merely used symbolic pictures for man's evil upsurging passions.

One can ask what it is that gives Luther's doctrine—as it is usually called—the power it has. The answer lies in the fact that it is no mere doctrine, it must be understood very differently if one is to do it justice. In one's imagination Luther, standing there in the 17th Century, must be visualized as looking back with inner sight to a time when communion was being cultivated with the spiritual world, to a time when he himself cultivated such communion precisely in the realm of the ahrimanic. To recognize Ahriman is to free oneself from him; the danger lies in not recognizing him—you can read more about this aspect of Ahriman in my Four Mystery Dramas. To come face to face with Ahriman, the way Luther did, is to set oneself free. What Luther says can seem incomprehensible unless one recognizes that he is describing actual experiences; when it is realized then the power of his words is greatly enhanced. Even when we find certain aspects of what he said unpalatable his words strike us as genuine because he saw things in a much wider context than is normally possible today.

It is an interesting and highly significant phenomenon that Luther should appear, embodying the fruits of what was taught in the pre-Christian Mysteries. Luther was one of the greatest participants in those Mysteries that prepared the way for the founding of Christianity. What he absorbed in these Mysteries remained quite unimpaired by the later intermediate incarnation and was the source and strength of his power in his incarnation as Luther. But what was Luther's most significant revelation concerning his direct experience of Ahriman?

We must keep in mind that the essentially ahrimanic age begins only after Luther. Though people are not aware of it, present-day natural-scientific knowledge is saturated by Ahriman. The characteristic feature of today's materialistic outlook is that every concept is prompted by Ahriman. Luther was destined, at a significant turning point to make man aware of this fact. However when someone is able to look into the spiritual world he sees things in a different light from those who cannot do so. Furthermore the spiritual world affects man differently once he becomes conscious of it.

We begin to understand Luther's peculiar position once we realize that the powerful force he brought over from an earlier evolutionary stage could not be effective in later epochs. He was destined to rescue for mankind a view of Christianity before it had been weakened by unrecognized ahrimanic influences. That is the reason for the breadth of his vision and the strength of his consciousness of Ahriman.

Someone once wrote a book in which he had collected all the contradictions to be found in Luther's writings. Luther read the book and wrote a reply which is included in a letter to Melanchthon. Luther's comment was: “The silly ass only speaks of contradictions because he understands neither side of a contradiction, he does not understand that one can honour someone as a Prince yet at the same time speak of him as a devil and oppose him.”—Luther's letter to Melanchthon, where he speaks of this, is most interesting, for it also reveals his relationship to his own time. He used other expressions which would not be used today but are entirely comprehensible in view of his acquaintance with the spiritual world. These expressions are not, as historians suggest, merely a product of his time. Those who call Luther's expressions cynical or frivolous do so out of their own cynicism or frivolity.

What is important in relation to these things is to recognize that individual aspects of something may recur, although the greater issue itself is not repeated. This applies also to Scholasticism; people will only learn to relate to it when they rediscover in it the more subtly differentiated thinking than the one cultivated today. The way the spirit came to expression in Luther will never be repeated. He must be accepted just as he is, as a historical phenomenon. It would be a mistake to imagine that anyone could repeat Luther's life. What one should do is to make so thorough a study of Luther, as he appears in history, that one comes to recognize what it was that revealed itself through him in this particular incarnation. One must attempt to see beyond the individual who was active in the mysteries preparing for Christianity and then had an intermediate incarnation before appearing as Luther. We need to see that we are not dealing here only with a certain individuality but that in this one phenomenon the whole trend and law of mankind's evolution is expressed. It could happen because of his former conscious experience—even though as Luther this knowledge had become subconscious—of that realm where he encountered the devil; i.e., Ahriman.

In general Luther is seen the way academics see him: theologians are usually academics. His direct experience of the spiritual world is disregarded and his talk of the devil is seen as the weakness of a great man. But in truth the weakness lies in those who speak in this way about Luther.

Then came—and here we see how evolution runs its course—the time after Luther when Ahriman permeated the materialistic view of life. Though man was not conscious of it this was the case especially in the 19th Century. From the eastern part of Europe the possibility will first emerge for man to know once more the realm he enters when he attains insight beyond the physical plane. This seems a strange fact when we at present look towards the East. We see there aspects revealing both the baseness and the greatness of Russian nature. Over several years we have described what is preparing itself in Russia. It is indeed a remarkable experience to watch what takes place there; one has to say that these people are children still. They really are children and when they are not children they are possessed.

How can one escape the realization that Kerensky³⁰ is possessed? Naturally he considers himself far above such a superstitious idea that Ahriman has taken possession of him. But Ahriman has learned to produce from Western science a thinking which is utterly alien to the East, alien because it is a thinking related only to processes of dying. Not only does Western thinking understand nothing about the Russian people; Easterners themselves—that is, the leading people in the East—who try to judge Russians with Western thinking do not understand the Russians. There is in the Russian people still something childlike, something that points to the future. And in the future it is destined to develop into the ability to look once more into the spiritual world, to develop a relationship once more with the spiritual world.

What is preparing in Russia for the future is in complete contrast to the preparations that were made for our own epoch at the time of the Great Luther. Our age looks back, it makes manifest a force working from the past. We are looking at something very remarkable in the contrast between Luther's experience of his time and for example the childlike experience of a Russian like Soloviev³¹ during the time leading up to the revolution. We are seeing two opposite poles which are related as North to South, or if an abstract comparison is wanted, as positive and negative electricity. Two opposite directions of thoughts and views; unable to understand each other. It is obvious from the way Soloviev speaks that he is remote from any understanding of Luther, and if we remain with Luther it is quite impossible to understand Soloviev. We must widen our horizon to encompass both positive and negative.

I wanted to place these important issues before you. When next we meet I shall attempt to present Luther as a self-contained individuality—not only as he appeared in his time but as he appears within mankind's evolution as a whole—from a point of view obtainable only through Anthroposophy.

• 26. Thomas Aquinas 1225–1274 Scholastic Philosopher
• 27. Henry More 1614–1687 English Philosopher.
• 28. Martin Luther 1483–1546 Inaugurator of German Reformation
• 29. Ricarda Huck 1864–1947
• 30. Alexander Feodorowitsch Kerensky b. 1881 Russian Politician
• 31. Wladimir Soloviev 1853–1900 Russian Philosopher and Poet

As a continuation of the last lecture I should like to draw your attention to certain matters which will throw light on Luther's place in history. From the outset I must make it clear that today's considerations of Luther will be from the point of view of spiritual science rather than that of religion.

What strikes one immediately when considering Luther in the light of spiritual science is the enormous importance the epoch itself had for his prominence and whole activity. The significance of the epoch is much greater in Luther's case than in the case of most other personalities in history. When we study Luther it is very important to be conscious of the epoch in which he appeared; i.e., the 16th century; which according to the spiritual-scientific view of history is very early in the fifth post-Atlantean cultural epoch. This epoch, as we know, began in the 15th century and the preceding Graeco-Latin epoch began some eight centuries before the Mystery of Golgotha. Thus Luther appeared in history soon after the thoughts and feelings, characteristic of the Graeco-Latin epoch, were fading in civilized humanity. To the unprejudiced observer Luther appears at first sight to have a dual personality, but one comes—as we shall see—to recognize that the two aspects meet in a higher unity. It must be realized that there is much more to the history between the 14th and 16th centuries than modern historians are inclined to admit. Great transformation took place, particularly in the human soul; this is something taken far too little into account. The people of the 13th and 14th centuries still had a direct relationship with the spiritual world through the very constitution and disposition of their soul. This is now forgotten but cannot be emphasized enough. When, at that time, man turned his gaze to external nature, to the sky, to cloud formations and so on, he would generally speaking still perceive elemental spirituality. It was also possible for him to commune with the dead with whom he had karmic links to a far greater extent than is believed today. In this period there was still, inherited from an earlier different consciousness, an immediate recognition that the world seen through the senses is not the only world. The transition in consciousness to later times was far more abrupt than imagined. Natural science, in itself fully justified, was then in its dawn, it drew a veil as it were over the spiritual world behind the physical world. I can well imagine that a modern student of history, who is in the habit of accepting what is taught as absolute truth, will not believe such abrupt transition possible. He would find it neither historical nor substantiated by records. However, spiritual science reveals that at this time the human soul came completely within the confines of the physical world by virtue of changes in man's inner being.

We saw last time that woven into Luther's soul was the after-effect of what he had absorbed, in a former incarnation, in the pre-Christian Mysteries that prepared the way for Christianity. Nevertheless he was in the fullest sense a true man of his time inasmuch as in this, the fifth post-Atlantean cultural epoch, man's former connection with the spiritual world has grown dim. This is so even when the experiences had been as vivid as those of former initiates in the Mysteries. It must not be supposed however, that what has become dim, and therefore fails to become conscious knowledge, is not present and active. It has its effect when, as in Luther's case, the person concerned through his inner karma is sensitive and receptive to what wells up from the depths of his being without reaching full consciousness.

It is not difficult to recognize in Luther the effects of what I have indicated. They reveal themselves in the agonizing torments he went through. These inner torments, while being expressions of his own soul, assumed in his words and ideas the character of his time. They were in fact caused essentially by a kind of realization that man in the fifth post-Atlantean epoch, the epoch of materialism, would be deprived of contact with the spiritual world. All the deprivation a materialistic age would inflict upon the deeper strata of the human soul weighed heavily upon Luther. Today one has to use different words from those he employed to describe what he felt so strongly. It is therefore not Luther's own words that I use in characterizing his inner experiences. But what he felt may be expressed in these words: What is to become of man when his vision is cut off from the spiritual world, as he is bound to forget what he formerly received from that world? If you imagine this feeling intensified to its limit you have the keynote of Luther's inner suffering. But why was it Luther who in particular felt this so intensely?

The reason is to be found in what I mentioned as the duality of his nature. Luther was on the one hand very much a man of the fifth post-Atlantean cultural epoch. But because he was also inwardly very much a man of the fourth post-Atlantean cultural epoch he felt with great intensity the deprivation which the people of the fifth epoch were already experiencing in his time, albeit not consciously. The duality in his nature was caused by the fact that—while being in complete accord with his own time, the fifth epoch—the teachings in the pre-Christian Mysteries had taken such deep roots in his soul that he inwardly felt as a man of the fourth epoch. He felt as related to the fourth epoch as an ancient Greek or Roman had felt. Odd as it may seem this had the effect that he could not understand the Copernican system of astronomy; i.e., a system based purely on physical calculations. This system, however, is in complete harmony with the outlook of the fifth cultural epoch but would have seemed meaningless in the fourth. This fact will seem strange to modern man whose view is that the apex of knowledge has been reached and that the Copernican system cannot be superseded. This is a shortsighted view as I have often pointed out. Just as today the Ptolemaic system is put to scorn, so will the Copernican be looked down upon in the future when it is replaced by another. However, in the fifth cultural epoch the very soul constitution of man enables him to have ready understanding for a system of movement of the heavenly bodies based entirely upon physical calculations.

Luther had no such understanding; to him the Copernican view seemed so much folly. He was little interested in the materialistic, purely spatial conceptions of the phenomena of the universe which occupied the human mind at the dawn of the fifth cultural epoch. Whereas the way man felt and experienced his place within that universe interested him greatly. However the relation to the world, which man perforce had to have, in the fifth cultural epoch was experienced by Luther with all the inner soul impulses of a man of the fourth-, the Graeco-Latin epoch.

Thus we see Luther on the one hand looking back at the way man was related to the spirituality of the Cosmos in the fourth cultural epoch. And on the other we see him looking ahead, being aware of the kind of experiences, feelings and conceptions to which man would be exposed by virtue of a relation to the cosmos which separates him from its spiritual reality. Thus Luther felt and experienced the fifth cultural epoch as a soul belonging to the fourth cultural epoch. The experiences man had to undergo in the fifth cultural epoch weighed heavily on his soul.

In order to have a clearer picture let us for a moment compare a modern man of average education with a man of the comparatively ancient time of the fourth epoch. The former's thoughts and feelings, his whole relation to the world is determined by the natural-scientific view of the world, whereas the latter's thoughts and feelings were determined by the fact that he was still aware of his connection with spiritual reality. What we designate as Imagination and Inspiration were particularly vivid for man at that time. It was a common experience that colors are not seen only through eyes, or sound heard only through ears. Man was aware that by inner effort he received pictorial and audible revelations from the spiritual world. Everyone was aware that a divine spiritual-world lived in his soul. Man felt inwardly connected with his God.

In the fifth post-Atlantean epoch man is subjected to a test and his communion with the spiritual world has to cease. In this epoch he has developed, through special methods and a special kind of knowledge, the possibility to observe the external phenomena of nature and their relation to his own being with great exactitude. But he no longer has vision of the spiritual world; no longer is there a path leading from the soul to the spiritual world.

Let us visualize these two types of human beings side by side. As we saw in the last lecture, Luther's knowledge and religious feelings concerning the spiritual world were not abstract; the spiritual world was not closed to him. He had a living communion with the spiritual world, more especially with evil spirits of that world. But that in itself is not an evil trait. Thus he knew of the spiritual world through direct experience, but he also knew that for mankind of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch this experience of the spiritual world was fading away and would gradually disappear altogether. It became a great riddle for Luther how the human beings of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch would cope with the deprivation of not beholding the spiritual world. As he contemplated the man of the fifth epoch his heart was overflowing with impulses brought over from his incarnation in the fourth post-Atlantean epoch. These living forces constituted a powerful link with the spiritual world which caused Luther to sense its reality with great intensity. It made him feel that it was essential to awaken in man a consciousness of that reality. At the same time he was under no illusion that human beings incarnating during the coming epoch would lose all consciousness of the spiritual world. They would have nothing but their physical senses to rely on, whereas in earlier times knowledge of the divine-spiritual-world had been attained through direct vision and experience. All Luther could do was to tell mankind: If in the future you look towards the spiritual world you will find nothing, for the ability to behold it will have vanished. If you nonetheless wish to retain awareness of its existence then you must turn to the Bible, the most reliable record in existence, a record that still contains direct knowledge of the spiritual world which you can otherwise no longer reach. In earlier times one would have said: besides the Gospel there is also the possibility to look directly into the spiritual world. This possibility has vanished for mankind of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch; only the Gospel remains.

So you see that Luther spoke from the heart and in the spirit of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch, but as someone who also belonged to the fourth post-Atlantean epoch. By means, still remaining from the fourth epoch, he wanted to draw attention to that which, because of his evolution, man in the fifth epoch could no longer reach. Luther may not have been conscious of these things exactly the way I describe them. However as things stood it is understandable that he, at the start of an epoch in which direct insight into the spiritual world would cease, pointed to the Gospel as the sole authority concerning the spiritual world. He wanted to emphasize that the Gospel was a special source of strength for mankind in the coming epoch.

Let us now turn our attention to something different. At the moment I am occupied with certain aspects of Christian Rosenkreutz and the “Chymical Wedding” by Johann Valentin Andreae and this brings certain things connected with the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries vividly before my soul. When one looks at those who during those centuries were engaged in science, one comes to realize that at that time knowledge of nature was alchemy in the best sense of the word. The natural scientist of today would have been an alchemist then. But to understand the spiritual aspect of alchemy it must not be thought of as connected with superstition or fraud. What were the alchemists attempting? They were convinced that there are other forces at work in nature besides those which can be discovered by external observation and experiment. They wanted to prove that while nature is indeed "natural" supersensible forces are at work in her.

To the alchemist it was obvious that, however firmly welded together the composition of a metal appeared to be, that composition could still be transformed into another. However they saw the transition as the result of a spiritual process, an effect of the spirit in nature. This is something that will be known again in future epochs, but in our time it is a deeply hidden knowledge. The alchemists were able to bring about alchemical processes which, if they could be demonstrated today, would greatly amaze modern scientists. In that earlier age it was part of man's knowledge that spiritual forces are at work in nature. The alchemical processes were brought about by manipulating those forces.

This knowledge inevitably had to be lost in the fifth post-Atlantean epoch. A reflection still exists in religious conceptions of the universe. In the earlier centuries, right up to the 13th and 14th, what was taught concerning the Sacraments was different from what could be taught in the following centuries, though for Luther it was still vivid inner experience even if not a fully conscious one. But the experience, that spiritual forces were directly active in consecrated substance, was lost to the faithful. Today the teaching of the Catholic sacrament is something quite different than it was, for example the doctrine concerning the sacrament at the altar, when bread and wine are to be transformed through a mysterious process into real flesh and blood. When one discusses this issue with Catholic theologians the usual answer to modern man's objection is: If you do not understand that you have no understanding whatever of Aristotle's teaching on substances. Be that as it may, one has to say that in the fifth post-Atlantean epoch no real meaning can be connected with an actual transubstantiation; i.e., with real alchemy. Today this process takes place above material existence. Today when man receives the bread and wine these are not transmuted. The divine-spiritual reality of the Christ Being passes into man as he receives the bread and the wine.

This metamorphosis of the concept of the sacrament is also connected with the transition in man's evolution from the fourth to the fifth post-Atlantean epoch. Luther, because of his very nature, had to speak out of the spirit of both epochs. He wanted to convey to man's soul the strength it had formerly gained from religious teaching. As the dawning natural science would never be able to acknowledge anything spiritual in matter, Luther sought to keep religious teaching aloof from the weakening effect of science. From the outset he kept spiritual issues strictly apart from physical processes. He thought of the latter, if not exactly as symbols, then at least as being merely physical.—It is not so easy to understand these things today but spiritual science must draw attention to them just the same.

We must envisage Luther turning his gaze, even if not fully consciously, towards the coming epoch spanning more than two thousand years, during which man would be able to experience something of the spiritual world only in exceptional cases and through special training. Historical personalities such as Luther must be seen in a wider perspective; their thoughts and actions must be seen as expressing the epoch in which they live. Luther as it were represented the human beings of his time, human beings to whom something was lost. What they had lost was caused by the fact that in the fifth post-Atlantean epoch human knowledge had assumed a form that made it impossible to strengthen the human soul, by means of the power inherent in knowledge itself, so that it could look into the spiritual world and have its own spiritual cognition. It is not normal for people of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch to have spiritual cognition through their own initiative. In his ordinary life in the fifth epoch man cannot be conscious of freedom in the real sense, of real freedom of will which is the ability to act directly out of that deepest region of the human soul where it is united with the divine. Today both freedom and knowledge are theoretical. As the fifth post-Atlantean epoch progressed the theory that there are limits to human knowledge has frequently been proclaimed. To speak of limits of knowledge in the sense of Kant³² or Dubois-Reymond³³ would have seemed meaningless in ancient times, even by the sceptics.

As mentioned already one should take what is said by a historical personality such as Luther as expressing the spirit of his epoch, not as having validity for all time. What Luther recognized as the outstanding characteristic of mankind in the fifth post-Atlantean epoch he interpreted in the light of Christianity. He understood it in the Christian, or better said Biblical sense, as a direct effect of original sin. The fact that man, out of his own forces, cannot attain either freedom, or knowledge of the divine, in the fifth epoch Luther saw as a direct outcome of original sin. Thus when he said that man was so corrupted by original sin that by himself he could not overcome it, Luther spoke a truth that holds good for the fifth post-Atlantean epoch. The force in man most closely bound up with his nature is the force that expresses itself in his will, in his actions. What a man does springs from the very center of his being. What he knows or believes is much more dependent on his environment, the time in which he lives and so on. In the fifth post-Atlantean epoch, the epoch of natural science and materialism, man is not able to perform actions that spring directly from the spirit. That in fact is the essential characteristic of this epoch. In the sixth post-Atlantean epoch it will again be different. But that man in the fifth epoch, in his ordinary consciousness, had lost the link connecting him with the spiritual world was also Luther's conviction.

Yet Luther was also aware that it is essential for man not to be torn out of that connection altogether. He saw that as an inhabitant of the external physical world man, through what he wills and does, has no connection with the Divine. He can only attain it if he regards this connection as something separate and apart from his external physical existence. From this thought originated the doctrine of salvation purely through faith. A typical man of the fourth epoch would have regarded salvation through faith alone as nonsensical. An ancient Greek or Roman would have found it meaningless if told that what he does, what he accomplishes in the world is not what gives him value in the eyes of the Highest Powers, but solely his soul's acknowledgement of the spiritual world. However, it is not meaningless to the man of the fifth epoch, for if his worth were dependent solely on what he accomplished in the physical world he would be in fact just a creature of that world. He would be more and more convinced that he merely represented the highest peak of the animal kingdom. Man had therefore to forge a link with the spiritual world by means of something that in no way linked him with the physical world. That something is faith.

What Luther thus impressed on his own and the following time could naturally not remain the only cultural influence in the fifth post-Atlantean epoch. One may ask who at the present time is a Lutheran? The answer is that, inasmuch as he is a man of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch, everyone is a Lutheran. Those with a sense for the subtle conceptual differences in world views will notice the enormous discrepancy between the views of a Catholic theologian in the 13th or 14th Centuries and those of his counterparts today. The reason is that the Catholic theologian of today is in reality a Lutheran, his outlook and impulses are those of a Lutheran. These are matters that go unnoticed because there is so little feeling for the inner truth of things, the attention is focused only on the external label applied to a person. It is after all merely an external matter that someone, because of family or some other connection, is entered in the Church register as Catholic or Protestant. What characterizes him inwardly is something quite different. The man of today who is truly of his time, who is stirred and influenced by what takes place, is inwardly a Lutheran. Like Luther he articulates the essence of the fifth epoch. Luther was especially suited to do so because of the characteristic duality of his nature. This made him question the fate of future mankind, but it also stirred in him an overwhelming impulse to speak to the people of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch with all the vigorous forces that he wanted preserved as they were in the fourth post-Atlantean epoch. That he was able to speak in this way was due to the higher unity of his dual nature. He spoke out of the very souls of the people exposed to the conditions of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch. He formulated and voiced the very concepts and ideas that stirred in them. But he also spoke so that everything he said was permeated with his impulse to preserve what had existed in the fourth post-Atlantean epoch. That was the higher unity. However, the sixth post-Atlantean epoch could not be prepared within the fifth had the latter not been influenced by other cultural streams.

Thus we see that Lutheranism, in the way indicated, is more particularly an impulse of the fifth epoch, but other cultural streams make themselves felt. The most important for us is the one that came to expression in the German classical period: from Lessing to Herder, Schiller, Goethe and others. A remarkable phenomenon is the fact that we have in the same period a thoroughly Lutheran philosopher in Kant, whose concepts represent the very essence of Lutheranism. Schiller had at one time an inclination to follow Kant but found that he could not; and indeed no philosophic work better illustrates the striving to get beyond mere Lutheranism than Schiller's Letters on the Aesthetic Education of Man. These letters—which are too little appreciated today—and also Goethe's Faust constitute as it were the apex of that other cultural stream. Both works stress that man must turn, not only to the Bible, but to the world and life itself in order to strengthen the human soul so that it can find, through its own forces, the path to the spiritual world. The concluding scenes of Faust represent the complete contrast to Lutheranism. Only a contrived interpretation could possibly bring Schiller's aesthetic letters, Goethe's Fairy Tale of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily and the last scenes of Faust in line with Lutheranism. We see in these works the human soul attaining strength through an inner opposition to the natural-scientific interpretation of the world. And in this way it finds, through its own forces, the connection with the spiritual world.

Ideas concerned with the legend of “Dr. Faustus” emerged already in the 16th Century in opposition to Luther's strong proclamations, but these ideas could not yet gain ground… Luther's attention was focused on the man of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch who, though possessed by ahrimanic demons, yet refuses to acknowledge the, to Luther well known, devil. It is not really surprising that Ricarda Huch, after occupying herself so intensely with Luther, comes to place such great importance on his direct knowledge of the diabolical realm of the spiritual world. Bearing in mind the story of the expulsion from the Garden of Eden, it is indeed interesting that in our time it is a woman who has this yearning that man should again recognize the devil who—especially when his view of life is purely naturalistic—has him by the collar. In her book about Luther this longing comes to expression: that if only man could experience the devil it would awaken him to a consciousness of God.

This cry for the devil, expressed by Ricarda Huch lives in man's subconscious. It is a cry she wants mankind to hear. To understand Ricarda Huch is easy for someone who knows that in every laboratory, in every machine, in short in all the most important spheres of modern civilization, the actual devil is present and active. I say this in plain words for it would be much better for people to be aware of the devil rather than, unknown to them, he should have them by the collar.

Luther's consciousness of the devil was for him a living reality mainly because he still experienced the spiritual world as would a man in the fourth post-Atlantean epoch. His vivid experience came to expression in his words, for he strove to make the man of the fifth epoch conscious of the devil by whom he was possessed without knowing it. Luther could not do otherwise than call up in the man of his time an awareness of the devil which differed from the way Faust experienced the devil. Faust deliberately sold himself in order to gain knowledge and power through the devil. Such a relationship to the devil was at first rejected in the 16th century. At that time only a negative submission to the devil could be envisaged. Goethe, and in fact already Lessing protested vigorously against that idea. One must ask why they had a different view of man's relation to the devil. It must be said that neither Lessing nor Goethe had the nerve openly to state their view of Faust's relation to the devil. Today it is much easier to speak openly of these things than it was at the time of Lessing and Goethe. An initiate may have wanted to tell his fellow men something different but if he had they would have torn him to pieces.

Let us attempt to understand Goethe's inner attitude to Faust. Goethe too had insight into the nature of man of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch. He knew of man's close relationship to the devil in this epoch. He knew that whenever man's consciousness is restricted to the material alone the devil; i.e., ahrimanic powers are always present. This state of consciousness constitutes for these powers a door through which they gain entry. Ahriman has easy access to man whenever his consciousness is limited to the purely material aspect of things or dimmed down below normal, as can happen through organic causes, agitation, rage or other uncontrolled behaviour. Goethe's insight made it impossible for him to adopt the materialistic view generally held. While he knew that ahrimanic powers are universally present he could not in all honesty represent them as something to be avoided or rejected. On the contrary what he wanted Faust to attain he had to achieve through direct contest with the devil. In other words the devil must be made to surrender his power, he must be conquered. That is the real meaning behind Faust's struggle with the devil, the evil Ahriman or Mephistopheles.

Now let us turn to Schiller who tries to adopt Kant's philosophy but comes to recognize the futility of doing so. In his Letters on the Aesthetic Education of Man he distinguishes between mere instinctive craving—which according to Luther arises from man's physical nature—and the spirit which reveals itself within his physical nature. A true Lutheran would say that man is addicted to his cravings and he cannot, through his own power, rise above them. Only faith can enable him to do so. He will then have been purified and redeemed through an externally existing Christ. Schiller said: No, something else is present in man: in the craving for freedom lives the power of the spirit which can ennoble the bodily cravings of man's physical nature. Schiller distinguishes physical nature, ennobled through the spirit, from the spirit becoming manifest through it. He shows that man is indeed separated from spiritual existence through matter, but that he nevertheless, out of himself, strives to reach the spirit by transforming matter; that is, physical existence, through inner alchemy.

One recognizes the spiritual greatness that could have enriched Western culture in works such as Schiller's aesthetic letters and also Goethe's Faust which presents in dramatic form the overcoming of ahrimanic powers in external life. What could have been achieved through the strong impulse towards the spirit contained in these works has not come about. And it fills one with pain and despair to see one's contemporaries turn instead, for their spiritual education, to such trash as the American “In Tune with the Infinite.”

I cannot refrain from repeating what happened to Deinhardt³⁴ of Vienna who wrote a very beautiful essay on Schiller's aesthetic letters in which he discusses the marvelous perspective their content opens up. I do not think anyone knows about Deinhardt today. He had the misfortune to fall and break his leg; when the doctor came he was told that he could not be healed because he was too undernourished. And so he died. But this small book by Deinhardt of Vienna is concerned with one of the deepest spiritual impulses that have sprung from Western culture. If only people would recognize and investigate what has actually germinated in Western culture we would cease to hear the empty phrase, “the best man in the best place,” and then people proceed, through lack of judgement, to select a nephew or a cousin as the best man in the best place. Continuously one hears it said that the right person for this or that position simply does not exist. That is not the case; what is lacking is rather people with judgement who know where to look. But that ability can only be attained through inner strength, developed by absorbing the spiritual impulses flowing through spiritual life. There is nothing abstract about what can be gained from great literary works. Rather they fill the human soul with spiritual impulses which further its development along the path that Goethe strode with such vigour, and whose goal he depicted with dramatic artistry in the last scene of his Faust. It has no meaning in our time to preserve the old just because it is old; but we must find those treasures of the past which contain seeds for the future. Nowhere is this better illustrated than in the classic works of Goethe, Schiller and Lessing.

I wanted to show where Lessing, Goethe and Schiller belong in recent cultural development because it enables us to understand better their predecessor Luther. To understand a personality such as Luther it is necessary to understand what stirred in the depth of his soul and caused him to speak the way he did. I believe that if in the light of these thoughts you approach what, especially in our time, comes to meet us with such force in Luther, you will discover many things about him which I cannot go into now. I am convinced that it has a special significance to immerse oneself in Luther in the present difficult time. There is perhaps no one better suited to convey the many aspects of the fifth post-Atlantean cultural epoch than Luther. He spoke so completely out of the spirit of the fifth epoch even though his words had their origin in the fourth epoch.

When faced with the way events are depicted in history we should sense how necessary it is to rethink them. We ought to sense that the present difficult time which has brought such misery upon humanity is the karmic effect of distorted, superficial thinking. We should sense that the painful experiences we go through are in many respects the karma of materialism. We must have the will to rethink history. I have often pointed out that history as taught today in elementary and secondary schools as well as in universities, perhaps particularly in the latter, is a mere fable, and is all the more pernicious for being unaware that it is but a fable that aims to present only external physical events. Should the events of the 19th century be presented just once as they truly were—merely those of the 19th century!—it would be an immense blessing for mankind. Referring to history Herman Grimm once said that he foresaw a time when those, now regarded as great figures of the 19th century, would no longer appear all that great, whereas quite other figures would emerge as the great ones from the grey mist of that century.

Because of the way history has come to be presented in the course of time the human soul must undergo a fundamental change in order to understand it properly. I have often said this but it cannot be stressed enough. Man's concepts nowadays lack the vigour and power required to cope with social needs, because they are based on such superficial views. This war is in reality waged because of shortsighted, obtuse and foggy ideas, and the men fighting it are in many respects mere puppets of those ideas. Today there is an incessant clamour for people's freedom, for international courts of arbitration and the like, all of which remains so many empty words because it makes no difference what is established as long as there is no deeper understanding of the real issues. Yet all these things could be achieved if, as is so greatly to be desired, spiritual science were able to rouse people to recognize the deeper impulses beneath the surface of ordinary life. But these things people today do not want to see. It is quite immaterial what is arranged whether in relation to war or to peace or whatever. What is needed is that our ideas, our understanding of the issues, cease to remain on the surface. One could wish that, just at this time, what Luther so forcefully proclaimed would be heard and understood. People would then come to recognize that in Luther spoke more than the man. In him the character of the epoch which began in the 8th century B.C. and ended in the 15th century A.D. united with the character of the epoch that followed; i.e., our own, which will endure for 2100 years.

In the true sense a historic personality is someone in whom there speaks a being from the Hierarchy of the Archai, a Time Spirit. Through such a personality the voice of the Spirit of the Time is heard. This must be recognized if one is to approach Luther with understanding.

• 32. Immanuel Kant 1724–1804 German Philosopher
• 33. Emil Du Bois-Reymond 1818–1896 German Physiologist
• 34. Heinrich Mariannus Deinhardt 1821–1879

A point has been reached in mankind's evolution when the riddle of existence becomes ever more significant for the human soul. Some are aware of the riddle but there is little inclination anywhere to seek ways and means of solving it.

Today I would like to point to an aspect of the riddle which many people come up against in everyday life. There are those who ask: Why is it that all over the world there is a discrepancy between man's intellectual and moral development? At present man's intellectual development expresses itself mainly in what could also be called, with more or less justification, scientific development. Most people's view of life is based on natural science. And what things has man not produced thanks to his intellect! I need not enumerate all the external products which make up our materialistic culture. When one thinks of all the ingenious means it has so far produced for destroying human life, for enabling men to slaughter one another, then, leaving aside all moral considerations, one must concede that the intellect has reached a certain high plateau in its development. Just think of all the scientific ingenuity necessary to produce all those instruments of death with which men mangle each other, causing untold suffering.

One can think of much that is negative and also of much that is positive in what has come about as a result of man's highly developed intellect. It has certainly progressed with unprecedented speed especially in the last centuries. Occasionally one comes across remarks made by the few who have noticed the glaring contrast between intellect and morality. Already years ago in his famous work The Riddle of the Universe, Ernst Haeckel³⁵ pointed out how man has progressed intellectually but in regard to morality he has in many respects remained at a primitive stage. There are also others who have remarked on this discord which tends to be noticed by persons who are awake and sensitive to what goes on in the world. However, due to modern man's lethargy and love of ease, people fail to become aware that only spiritual knowledge can throw light on these profound problems with their far-reaching consequences for the human soul. If one is to find one's way through the complexities of present-day life no other possibility exists than to attempt to understand them in the light of spiritual science. Anyone with a feeling for reality finds it painful to witness the unease, the unwillingness that exists all over the globe to face openly and courageously the things that are happening both above and below the surface of events. Today people are apt to deplore immoral measures taken in the past. This seems strange in view of the fact that they fail to judge what goes on at present all over the world which is far worse than anything that has happened before in human evolution. Let us for once look at the relationship between man's intellectual and moral development in the light of spiritual knowledge.

Our first enquiry must concern what exactly takes place in the human being when he is engaged in intellectual pursuits. What aspects of our being is active when we formulate scientific thoughts; i.e., when we investigate external phenomena? We reflect on the laws of nature to enable us, through understanding them, to form appropriate mental pictures. This activity engages parts of man's being which are the most mature. When we look at what is today the foundation, the tool of the intellect then we are looking at those aspects of man which were developed and incorporated into his being in the course of the ancient Saturn, Sun, Moon and the present Earth evolutions. When on the other hand we seek to understand the foundation of man's moral development we cannot refer to such mature constituents of his being. In regard to his moral evolution we are dealing with comparatively much younger members of human nature. In actual fact only man's 'I' can be said to be moral in the true sense. But, as I have often said: man's 'I' is the baby among the members of his being. Even in regard to the astral body, incorporated into man's being during the ancient Moon evolution, one can speak of moral impulses only insofar as the astral body, being intimately connected with the 'I' during life, may receive moral impulses from the latter. It must also be borne in mind that the 'I' and astral body have a comparatively independent existence; every night when we fall asleep they free themselves from the physical and etheric bodies. They are then in a state of complete unconsciousness and therefore cannot receive moral impulses.

The following is of great importance but somewhat difficult for modern man to understand: Every time we awake from sleep we enter, with our ‘I’ and astral body, into our physical and etheric bodies; i.e., into the oldest members of our being. These members, having evolved through the Saturn, Sun and Moon evolutions have attained a certain degree of perfection which makes them pre-eminently suitable tools for the intellect. Their degree of perfection is something that is inborn in them and manifests as intellectual proficiency. If the 'I' and astral body were not added to our physical and etheric bodies we would in a certain sense be thinking machines; we would be scientific automatons. In accordance with their nature our physical and etheric bodies do in fact act automatically in certain ways. It is only because the ‘I’ dwells in them that they are capable of further development on earth. But the ‘I’ could do little towards perfecting the physical and etheric bodies, even in regard to their intellectual ability, if it were not transported every night into sleep. We attain our best forces, also in regard to intellectual development, during sleep. It is because the physical and etheric bodies are perfectly developed tools that the already existing intellectuality can become further developed by what the 'I' has received from the spiritual world during sleep and bestows upon them on waking. During waking life we have in addition our consciousness which we attain by virtue of the physical and etheric bodies. We have at present no comparable consciousness as far as the ‘I’ and astral body are concerned. This should be kept well in mind. Man believes he knows his ‘I,’ but in what sense does he know it? If you have, say, a red surface and cut a hole in it through which you look into darkness; i.e., into nothingness, you will then see the red surface and the hole as a black circle. You look into nothingness. In your inner life you see your ‘I’ the way you see the black circle in the surrounding red. What man believes to be perception of his 'I' is in fact a gap in his soul life. Though nothing is there, or very little, man believes he perceives his ‘I.’ In actual fact all he sees is what his brain reveals to him through his etheric and physical bodies. In the present phase of evolution man has not come very far in perceiving his own ‘I’ while in a physical body between birth and death.

We are unconscious during sleep, but during the day, while awake, we are still unconscious as far as our ‘I’ is concerned. Yet morality must be implanted into the ‘I.’ So you see, as far as morality is concerned—compared with his intellectuality—man is very much a baby. That is the deeper reason why it is so difficult for man, during earth evolution, to advance morally, while intellectually he progresses with comparative ease.

In a periodical founded during the war entitled The Bell an article recently appeared discussing the discrepancy between intellectual and moral development. Despite its name, The Bell seldom rings out much sense; according to its opinion on this matter, the discrepancy can be traced to the fact that intellectual development has come about under capitalism, in other words during a time when rulership was in the hands of the few, whereas moral development will come about only when socialism has been established. Well, idealists insist that the earth will become paradise when idealism gains the upper hand. Materialists make the same claim for materialism while, according to liberals, paradise comes about when liberalism is generally accepted. So naturally socialists see paradise as the realization of socialism. These views are all incredibly naive. They are in fact so many trite illusions all of which demonstrate that, while modern man is beset by problems, he still will not rouse his thinking—and on thinking it at first depends—to the irksome task of penetrating into the realm of spiritual experience. Anyone who will really think can penetrate to spiritual reality. Our age that prides itself in its thinking knows thinking the least.

The discrepancy between intellectual and moral development can only be explained when seen in the greater contexts just outlined. But the article in The Bell comes to the conclusion that as long as there are individuals who are intellectual, intellectuality will continue to develop, whereas moral life will reach a comparable development only when all people are merged within a socialist order. Thus capitalism is supposed to be favourable for intellectuals who are scientifically inclined, while socialism will be favourable for moral development. The reality however, is very different, for interest in the spiritual world must take hold of man if morality is to develop to the same extent as intellectuality has done. Men must become able actually to behold the spiritual forces and impulses that surge and pulsate through the world. There are many reasons why this is highly uncomfortable for modern man. For example, when someone embarks upon developing his thinking, in ways I have often described, his thinking becomes capable of functioning in the spiritual world. This means that in his thinking he experiences the spiritual world as a reality. This leads him of necessity to develop something else which has declined during our materialistic age, namely, an inner feeling of responsibility.

People whose view of life is based solely on their natural-scientific knowledge and observations are determined, in the way they think, by external events. Their thinking is as it were attached to the leading strands of the external phenomena and guided by them. The concepts they acquire enable them, up to a point, to understand external events. However, this kind of thinking in no way suffices to recognize moral and social issues in their reality; let alone find solutions to moral and social problems. In order to achieve this one must be in contact with spiritual reality, which however creates in the soul a strong feeling of responsibility for one's thoughts. One will not permit every arbitrary train of thought to go through the soul but only such which are, as it were, fit to be seen by the Beings of the Higher Hierarchies. Proclaiming freedom for nations is not a concept fit to present to spiritual worlds; it illustrates the kind of mistaken concept, generally held today, concerning the individual's relation to his folk. We know from spiritual science that freedom is a concept which is applicable only to human beings as individuals; quite different concepts apply to nations with their group souls. Yet around the world today freedom of nations and the like is being proclaimed, giving voice to Woodrow Wilson's immature ideas. They are even taken seriously! In fact they are also taken seriously within Europe; though we, with centuries of experience should at least be able to produce a few enlightened ideas, ideas that could, in the sense of spiritual science, throw some light on the issues.

It is possible to feel responsibility, not only towards people, but towards concepts and ideas; if they are moral ideas they exist entirely in the spiritual world, for they arise in our T or possibly in the astral body. However, one does not have this feeling of responsibility if one lives exclusively in materialistic concepts and ideas; i.e., ideas that relate solely to external phenomena as often happens without awareness. One hears phrases such as: God sent us this war because of our sins and shortcomings. Uttering such phrases does not indicate moral or spiritual ideas; it indicates rather no advance beyond materialism. Such an advance only comes about when one is able to form mental pictures of spiritual reality. Plenty of phrases are coined these days which have no foundation in reality; it happens especially when it comes to discussing this or that political issue. On such occasions one often hears talk of a "new spirit" which does not mean in the least that the person concerned has the slightest inkling of the spirit.

If we are to extricate ourselves from the present devastating conditions, the spirit must not remain abstract; it must be grasped in its reality. As already mentioned it is possible to understand this or that external phenomenon with the kind of concepts engendered by simply following the leading strings of physical perception. They do not, however, have the power to influence the intricacies of human life; the latter require concepts and ideas derived from spiritual insight. You may ask how it then comes about that human life is after all influenced occasionally. It is because human beings still rely on old, even ancient ideas though they no longer fit the changed conditions. Our age demands new concepts, new mental pictures, derived from spiritual knowledge. Naturally, these ideas are new only in the sense that they are new to mankind.

However, these new ideas are at times found to be unpalatable especially when they relate to human morality seen in the light of spiritual knowledge. It is easy enough to say that good will is a virtue and should be cultivated, or that justice is moral and ought to be established. It is also easy enough to make laws and arrangements accordingly. One can even elect parliaments in which clever people come together to make all kinds of decisions based on good will and justice. But if things are handled the way they have been so far they will result in something similar to the situation we see spread all over the world today, if only people would have the courage to recognize that there is a direct connection between the terrible events taking place at present and the kind of concepts and ideas which preceded them.

Good will is certainly a virtue and one can even get a sensuous feeling of pleasure from practicing it. A kind of cathechism of virtues could be devised: Thou shalt have good will, thou shalt be just and so on; one would then possess a list of virtues and no understanding of any of them. It would in fact be comparable to knowing that when a pendulum is at its highest point the law of gravity will bring it down to the lowest, but not knowing that in coming down the pendulum gathers a force that makes it swing equally far up the other side. In regard to physical phenomena these things are easy to recognize because the external phenomena themselves enforce one's thinking to be consistent, but in the sphere of morality there are no such leading strings.

If a person develops good will it is certainly an excellent thing. However, just as the pendulum in its downward swing gathers the force that will make it swing upwards, so there develops with the force of good will a tendency to its opposite, a tendency to prejudice, biassed views and the like. No virtue can be cultivated without developing also a disposition towards the opposite vice. These truths are not comfortable but truths they are. In the individual they are less noticeable, but in public life they result in the kind of thing I have indicated. If people in one age one-sidedly cultivate some virtue and pride themselves over much in the fact, then people in the following age, although the connection is not recognized, will exhibit the corresponding vice. Seen in their true light these things point to a deep truth uttered by Christ Jesus but one which people will not acknowledge.

At the present time a strange current flows like a current through the world taking hold of souls like an epidemic. It is hard to believe that such views can be held, but they are. It appears that people have come to the conclusion that this war must be continued until an everlasting peace can be won. The war must go on till the impact of the war itself provides an absolute guarantee that there never will be another. Obviously the best way to achieve everlasting peace is to let the war go on forever. Simply by striving, as is done at present, for the ideal of everlasting peace will ensure that the war never ends! We live in a physical body, on the physical plane and the physical plane is not and cannot be perfect. If at one time or another the most perfect conditions possible were established it would only be a matter of a few centuries and they would be imperfect; because evolution progresses in oscillations, not in a straight ascending line. As the pendulum swings up and down, so does evolution move in lines of ascent and descent. If one epoch has developed something perfect, it need only wait and people will come who know of things still more perfect.

What matters is not the perfection with which things are arranged on the physical plane, which in any case is an impossibility, an illusion. What matters is man's freedom. Liberalism, socialism, conservatism all want to create paradise on earth; i.e., they want to realize something perfect on the physical plane. Christ said: “The kingdom of God is within you.” To want to make the physical world into a perfect paradise is to want something impossible, for in the physical world there is perpetual oscillation. The Christ Principle is understood rightly only when one strives to permeate the physical world with spirituality and recognizes that man is a participant of the realm of the Gods, the realm of the spirit. Those who want to turn the physical world into a paradise, whether in the socialistic or some other sense, know nothing about reality. If the present unreal ideas are to be replaced with ideas based on reality things must be seen in their wider spiritual context. This can be done only through spiritual science. Today people are apt to be scornful of the vistas opening up through knowledge of the evolutions of Saturn, Sun, Moon, Earth, Jupiter, etc. People are apt to ask why all that is necessary? Yet this knowledge is needed in order to understand even the tiniest aspect of life, for man is truly a microcosm. He bears within him the Saturn, Sun, and Moon evolutions, and if he does not want to know about them he places himself in a situation comparable to denying someone the use of his hands for life by tying them behind his back in early childhood. Similarly man does not make use of his capabilities if he refuses to turn his gaze towards spiritual reality. By this refusal he fails grievously in a sphere where he need not fail.

I would like to give you an example which may seem strange to some but which perhaps conveys more exactly what I mean by many of the things which I have only touched on today. I have recently spoken with various people about what is necessary to get mankind out of the present calamities and blind alleys. What must be done can be expressed in a number of practical ideas with which thinking must be quickened when it comes to questions such as—I cannot go into details now—answering the Papal note. Although these ideas are nothing but practical answers to immediate problems, they can neither be attained nor understood unless an impulse towards spiritual knowledge is present. They deal with the kind of thinking, the ways and means, necessary if man is to find a solution to the present confusion concerning how the various peoples and countries are to coexist. They concern arrangements to be made between peoples and countries and how to avoid resorting to illusory, abstract notions which only result in unrealistic declarations about people's freedom, peaceful cooperation between smaller nations and the like.

It is indeed possible to work out eminently practical ideas which can lead to salvation from the present miseries. But what kind of thing happens instead? Perhaps you have read in the papers about the new principal of Berlin University being installed. The new principal, Councillor Penck³⁶ has been lecturing on political frontiers based on geological factors. It is impossible to convey the heaviness of heart such occurrences cause one. And why? Because at what should be the most enlightened places for present-day cultural life, the most unenlightened, elementary ideas are presented. If minds had been occupied instead with spiritual knowledge, then comprehensive ideas of truly practical use for life would have emerged. Just think of the present situation: we have on the one hand spiritual science which can work out ideas with practical application for the present problems, ideas of a comprehensive nature which would reveal connections of a higher order between the issues. On the other hand we have the recognized official enquiries, still groping tentatively in the most basic aspect of the problems with no prospect of getting any further. Those to whom people today look up and regard as highest authorities are far removed from any understanding of what is so desperately needed and attainable through spiritual science. That is what makes it difficult to explain what is necessary, especially in relation to the present situation. Official science is concerned with rudiments of a scientific investigation yet that in itself could lead to spiritual science if those concerned did not regard it as so much fantasy which they refuse to consider.

One is reminded, without presumption or lack of humility, of how the first Christians in early Roman times had to perform their religious worship down in the catacombs; while up above the old social order continued as before. But a few centuries later what had become of that old order whose treatment of early Christianity we learn from Roman history? Within a few centuries it had dissolved, and what had once existed down in the catacombs was now above and had spread far and wide. If only a sufficient number of people could understand that something similar must come about today even if not of the same magnitude as Christianity itself. What today dominates the world as the customary outlook based on official science cannot endure. It has the same relationship to the needs of the present as ancient Rome to Christianity evolving below in the catacombs.

This world issue, this world antithesis must be inwardly experienced. One must enter into it with thoughts and feelings in order to become fully aware of the shallowness, when at present there are declamations about a "new spirit." One must become aware of how futile are the unintelligible ideas about guarantees to be provided by international organizations and courts of arbitration, despite the fact that no one knows who would be able to arbitrate. The time has come when concepts and ideas connected with the great world issues must be related to those of everyday life. Mankind cannot simply say that such concepts and ideas are all very well when it is a question of grasping world events but they do not apply to everyday issues. Either they are so applied or these very issues become meaningless and lose all significance for practical life, not that of a decade hence but for today and tomorrow.

When difference of opinion is expressed usually a degree of objectivity is exercised, but not when the object of contention is spiritual science or Anthroposophy. When someone like Max Dessoir, a professor at Berlin University, attacks spiritual science, he regales his readers with misrepresentations and falsifications, as I have shown in my book that will be published shortly. What should be an honest objective discussion becomes a personal attack, personal vilification when the issue is spiritual science. And why? Not because people are able to refute spiritual science, but because they do not want it. The reason they do not is because modern man shuns the irksome task of seeking within himself for his true humanity. People like for example, to rejoice and take pride in their moral concepts, but this is no longer possible when one knows that virtues will of themselves turn into their corresponding vices unless a strict watch is kept over one's life of soul.

I have often drawn attention to the question of selflessness. Once in a public lecture I gave as a hypothetical example a society founded for the purpose of cultivating selflessness. The members soon formed the habit of turning to those who managed the society saying: I would like such and such but not for myself; it is for someone else; then the “someone else” would also ask for something not for himself but for the one who first asked. Neither wanted anything for himself! The essential thing is not whether one wants something for oneself or for someone else but whether the request itself is a selfless one. The truth is that when people try to become selfless then after a time the power inherent in selflessness makes them egoistic. The very striving for selflessness makes for egotism. One has to take care when "the pendulum swings down" not to rejoice in one's own selflessness.

Luther was very aware of these things, that is why we find in his writing many instances when he seemingly shows little respect for such virtues as selflessness and the like. He knew that selflessness is usually a mask behind which hides a hypocrite. Luther could often be blunt about such matters. For example, he advises Melanchthon not to try to be so frightfully selfless but rather do the bad he felt like doing. For it is better to do the bad when so inclined than be an insincere pharisee who ostensibly does the good while inwardly wanting to do the bad. Luther had a great deal of insight into this polarity in human nature because of his particular kind of spiritual experiences. For example he was in Rome in the year 1510; at that time it was considered virtuous to climb a very high flight of stairs—I do not know the technical Catholic term for so doing. For every stage climbed a certain number of days in purgatory were remitted, if the whole flight of steps were climbed on one's knees without getting up many days of purgatory were remitted. Luther took part in this, for at that period of his life he had the view that by such means one could further one's salvation. However as he was climbing he had an Imagination which conveyed to him: Seek righteousness in faith! It was this kind of experience that made Luther the man he was. He inwardly sensed the contrasting forces that were engendered in his soul by what he was doing.

What is needed at the present time above all else is a deeper insight into human life. This means among other things to have the ability to recognize that the repetition of a word does not necessarily mean one has the reality to which it points. Many utter the word “spirit” but it is possible to talk a great deal about spirit and not come anywhere near it. This is not generally noticed. For example there is a man who has written what amounts to a whole library; I should not like to have to count how many times the word spirit appears in his library. People actually believe that this man, Rudolf Eucken,³⁷ is talking about real spirit. In this realm it is essential to differentiate between reality and mere appearance. To do this causes disquiet, it creates fear of spiritual life, even fear of thinking itself. The man of today wants to flee from thinking, he wants to find his own salvation as well as solutions to social and political problems by any means other than thinking.

The time is too serious, too grave not to take these things in deep earnestness. It will be a day of blessing when a greater number of people recognize the truth and reality of what I have indicated again today, unfortunately no more than indicated. To go into these things in greater detail would mean speaking about things which cannot be spoken of today. That is why it would be a good thing if you, especially after these lectures, would apply to them some real thinking that is as yet not censored. I said in the last lecture that today people would tear to pieces anyone who spoke openly about the immediate events as seen with supersensible vision. Certain things cannot be mentioned let alone done. Thus many opportunities are lost when one could illustrate how essential it is for present-day man to deepen and strengthen his inner life. Just imagine what would have become of the Lutheran movement had Luther not possessed far greater, stronger and more effective forces than those possessed by most leading figures today.

One may ask why people today show so little interest in spiritual knowledge. The real reason is, what I have often referred to, that man finds it disquieting, uncomfortable. The natural-scientific view of the world is based on concepts and ideas which are easier to digest. They are certainly to be admired but all one must do to acquire them is to look at the phenomena and allow the external facts to lead one along. One is not required to rouse oneself inwardly, one does not have to delve into the deepest recesses of one's soul in order to take the next step. Spiritual knowledge does indeed make such demands and one is bound to say that unless a human being is willing to make such efforts he is not man in the true sense. That is also a truth which is not pleasant to hear, especially by someone who, thanks to prevailing conditions, is in a position of authority. That a professor or a privy councilor is not supposed to be a human being in the fullest sense is naturally difficult to understand. However, it is the kind of thing that must be understood if we are to emerge from the miseries we are in at present.

In the year 1613 Johann Valentin Andrae³⁸ wrote The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz; the book appeared in 1616. During the years from 1614 to 1617 Valentin Andrae wrote other works in which he expresses the thoughts and feelings of his time. One of his books has as its subtitle: "To the Princes and Heads of States." Andrae wanted to show that what man believes himself to be and what he believes others to be is maya, is a great illusion. He wanted man to have the opportunity to learn to know his true self and that of others. He had in mind a great spiritual movement and had given much thought and preparation to its realization. Two outstanding events were in preparation at that time: the movement Valentin Andrae wanted, and the Thirty Years' War, lasting from 1618 to 1648. The events that led to the Thirty Years' War made impossible the movement which Johann Valentin Andrae wanted to bring about. Much would have to be said if one were to describe the various causes for this failure. Attempts are often made which fail but which later succeed. There was at that time a possibility that it may have succeeded but it did not. Today we again find ourselves within two streams, two possibilities, which must of necessity affect one another. On the one hand there is Anthroposophy with the impulse to further human evolution; on the other hand there is all that which has brought about events, similar in nature to those that caused the Thirty Years' War. It depends upon mankind whether once again what ought to happen is prevented from happening. Lethargy, love of ease might well paralyze the present attempt. Whether things would then take their course as they did when the attempt made by Valentin Andrae was paralyzed is another matter.

One should not ask a question such as: Why do the spiritual powers not intervene in the affairs on the physical plane and bring order about? That ought not to be asked because what human beings do is often in direct revolt against the spiritual powers. Very often those in revolt are the very people who are forever talking about spirit, spirit, spirit. I recently read on the cover of a magazine an advertisement of some kind in which the word spirit was repeated ad nauseam. These days spirit dominates everything, it is enough to make one despair! Spirit is supposed to manufacture the germs and gas masks and what not. Everything is called spirit. The question is: do people realize what spirit this is? As you know we distinguish between the spirit of normal evolution and the luciferic and ahrimanic spirit. I drew your attention to Ricarda Huch and how, in her book on Luther she expresses a positive longing for the devil, she means of course for recognition of the devil. Concerning all the proclamations about spirit one could say that people never notice the devil even when they have him on the covers of magazines.

There are many things which today I could only hint at, and many I could refer to only in a veiled manner. They will become clear to you if you reflect on what has been said today. One thing you will have noticed: that I have spoken in deep earnest, in bitter earnest which is also the way I must, for the time being, bring these lectures to a close.

• 35. Ernst Haeckel 1834–1919 German Biologist
• 36. Albrecht Penck 1858–1945 German Geographer
• 37. Rudolf Euchen 1846–1926 Philosopher
• 38. Johann Valentin Andreae 1586–1654 Theologian

It is fair to warn the reader that this is not an easy book. Should he be broaching the territory, without any previous knowledge of Rudolf Steiner's work and techniques, simply as one option in his search for a convincing critique of the prevalent materialism (or, as it is more commonly called, reductionism), he might do better to begin with one or both of two other books by the same author, The Origins of Natural Science and The Boundaries of Natural Science. There is little doubt that dissatisfaction with reductionism is gradually becoming more widespread (compare the tiny minority that was touched by it in the Victorian age); and it is perhaps significant that another change in the current world-view appears to be accompanying it. I mean an increasingly wide acceptance of the notion that human consciousness itself is in process of evolution; that there has not merely been a ‘progress’ from one set of ideas (largely erroneous) about the nature of the world and humanity towards a more ‘advanced’ one, but that the very structure of consciousness, the whole relation between man and nature, has been changing through the millennia.

Nowhere is this perspective, and the revised cosmology it entails, more explicit than in the literary legacy of Rudolf Steiner, and nowhere is its importance more earnestly stressed. The title of the present work already contains the difference between evolution of consciousness and history of ideas. History is the record of a conscious process, and the term is often extended to signify the process itself. Evolution is a process occurring at a pre-conscious stage, and up to the present this has applied also to the evolution of consciousness. Thus, the karma of materialism is not the same as the history of materialism. Karma is the name of a process operating at an unconscious level in the development of a human individuality, a process normally observable only in its effects; and the Karma of materialism is such a process operating in the development of materialism. So underneath the history of materialism (which would amount to a history of ideas, culminating in reductionism) Steiner reveals an unconscious process extending both before and after that history. Reductionism as theory manifests first in natural science, but the change of consciousness underlying it began much earlier, and it continues now irrespective of theory and affects the whole life of humanity. These lectures were delivered in the year 1917, when the catalogue of global disasters, which Steiner saw as the Karma of materialism, was still not long past its dawn; and it is with the effects of materialism in the social and political life, of humanity, both national and international, that they mainly concern themselves.

Just as in Boundaries of Natural Science Rudolf Steiner argues the necessity of penetrating this hitherto unconscious realm for the future health of science itself, so here he argues its necessity in order to cope with social and political problems that are growing more and more intractable as they are less and less understood. Penetrating it with what? With strengthened and energetic thinking. Notwithstanding his admiration for the achievements of natural science, disciplined as it is by its constant relation to observable fact, he accuses it of one disastrous oversight. While it has devised and continues to devise ever more elaborate and more precise tools for investigation, it has left unexamined and unimproved the first and most essential, the most ubiquitously applied, of all its tools. It has never tried to examine the nature of thinking itself; the point at which unconscious process blossoms into, or rather “sets” as, conscious thought. In the Boundaries course Steiner describes a method by which scientists could embark on such an examination. Here he is more concerned with the effects that have stemmed from their failure to do so at the time of the scientific revolution and after it. This involves reverting to that period in history and to the period preceding it. It is no use just saying: yes, there has been an evolution of consciousness, and it has resulted in materialism. It is no use simply chronicling effects; the process itself must be penetrated, and penetrated in detail; and if this entails reference to the thought processes of such historical figures as Thomas Aquinas and Martin Luther, so be it.

The first step however is to delineate the process itself, as far as possible, and this he does in Lecture III by way of a careful treatment, both synchronic and diachronic, of the relation between intellect, perception and breathing. The lecture should be read carefully, for it is there that he lays the foundation for the doctrine which he will go on to inculcate. Namely, that the unconscious is not just ‘spirit’ (still less of course the Freudian psycho-physical jumble); nor is it simply an inferred and unknowable 'world of spirit'; it is a world of active spiritual beings, whose particular aims and influences are not wholly, and will become less and less, beyond the reach of human knowledge.

Or perhaps it would be truer to say the doctrine which he will go on to assume. That is one of the reasons why it is a difficult book, not simply because such an immaterial cosmology is repugnant to the contemporary mind-set: for repugnant it certainly is, except to a level of open-mindedness that is deplorably rare. Open-mindedness at a somewhat lower level is not so infrequent. There are many minds in our time acutely aware of the apparent impotence of the human spirit to deal with the complex and apparently insoluble problems that increasingly threaten its continued existence, and which go so far as to proclaim that a new kind of consciousness seems to be demanded of us. What is wanted, these uneasy people say, is altogether new ideas, a new kind of thinking. But they usually forget that the new is by definition unfamiliar; so that, when they are confronted with a picture of the universe that is not just a rearrangement of the old picture, but is really new and therefore wholly unfamiliar, they are offended or contemptuous. It becomes clear, Steiner repeats with emphasis and with examples to drive it home, that what they really wanted was something that looks new but is in fact old enough to feel quite comfortable. Confronted by anything beyond that they refuse even to examine the evidence for it. Exclamation marks are a sufficient refutation.

For many readers there will be the added difficulty of what they will feel as its author's tendency to plunge in medias res. Quite early in the book they will be confronted by references to named spiritual beings to whom they have not been introduced, notably certain of the spiritual hierarchies, who have been differently named in different traditions, but for whom Steiner uses the nomenclature found with their earliest recorded appearance in the extant literature of the West, that is the work of ‘pseudo-Dionysius’; and, over and above these, to the 'adversary' figures of Lucifer and Ahriman, especially the latter. If the reader is wise, he will reflect that, where knowledge of the immaterial itself is at issue, and not simply knowledge of its material effects, it is the same as with all knowledge. Neither things nor beings can be spoken of without being identified, or identified without being named: It remains true that some previous acquaintance with the literature of Steiner's anthroposophy will greatly reduce this difficulty, and will prevent the names being merely names. Nor is there much doubt that most of his original audience enjoyed such an acquaintance.

Some acquaintance then with the literature of anthroposophy is desirable in a reader of this book. But I would not say it is indispensable. There is another way of acquainting oneself with unfamiliar terminology besides starting with a set of definitions. Indeed definitions, though useful in forestalling error, may even hinder close acquaintance with the actuality of what is defined, inasmuch as they tend to substitute abstraction for experience. The other way of twigging the meanings of unfamiliar words is to plunge into contexts wherein they occur more than once, and sometimes perhaps by way of casual reference, and thus gradually to approach nearer and nearer to them by experiencing their use in those contexts. Incidentally if this way were not a way that is wide open to us, we should never have learned to speak or to understand anything at all.

I believe therefore that readers will not be lacking who will by-pass any initial stumbling-blocks as they enter into the substance of the book and become more and more impressed by its whole tone, by the authority born of wide learning, long reflection and exceptional insight and by the profound sense of responsibility, alike to the truth and to humanity, that breathe through its wide-ranging paragraphs.

Owen Barfield

At present, the circumstances of life do not lend themselves to celebration of festivals in the usual sense. In these difficult times it would be best for us to investigate aspects of spiritual science which in some measure can help us understand the deeper-lying causes of the present situation. In view of this, I propose to speak about certain results of spiritual investigation which throw light on this question. Let us try to focus our attention on a certain aspect of mankind's evolution during post-Atlantean times up to the present.

We know from various subjects, discussed on earlier occasions, that it is possible in a certain sense to compare mankind's evolution as a whole with the development gone through by the individual, if for no other reason than that, at least at first sight, both appear as a progress taking place in time. In particular, I have been investigating, for years, the inner evolutionary conditions of post-Atlantean humanity. Much has come to light, especially this winter, which is of great significance also in relation to the question just mentioned.

From an external viewpoint it may seem that when human progress is observed over a certain length of time, one cannot but come to the conclusion that a certain section of mankind's evolution corresponds to the development of the individual between this and that given age. It would therefore seem that mankind's evolution as a whole follows a course similar to that of the individual human being. However, investigation shows that this is by no means the case. Furthermore it is also revealed that important secrets, particularly in relation to the present age, are connected with the fact that this is not true. Going back to the first post-Atlantean cultural epoch, which we can do with the help of concepts familiar to us from spiritual science, the epoch we usually designate as the ancient Indian, we may ask: Which age in the life of the individual human being corresponds to mankind's age in general in that ancient epoch? Spiritual investigation discovers something quite remarkable. I have often mentioned that today it is too lightly assumed that in former times, within the cultures that were then in existence, man's soul configuration was more or less as it is now. That assumption is quite wrong and has arisen because modern man, with his materialistic-scientific outlook, is simply incapable of forming any idea of how man's soul, and in particular his inner life, has changed within a comparatively short period.

If we look at the human being as he is today, we notice that during a certain period of his development his physical body is the first to mature. His bodily organs develop both in their coarser and finer structure. Not only does the human being become larger, his organs become more perfect externally as well as internally. We see that up to a certain age the development of his spirit and soul is bound up with the development of the physical body; the two as it were take a parallel course. No educator can ignore this fact with impunity. We also know that this interweaving of the spirit and soul development with that of the body comes to an end at a certain age. Man is then considered fully developed. When we look at life, we cannot fail to notice that human beings, as early as possible, consider themselves a finished product with no need for any further learning. To suggest that they may read Goethe's Iphigenia or Schiller's Wilhelm Tell after a certain age is considered by many to be asking too much. This is something one reads at school, it belongs to youth; in later life one no longer concerns oneself with such things! This may not be a general view but it is certainly very widespread, and a similar attitude can be observed in many other spheres of life. It is an attitude that has its origin in something quite fundamental. From a certain point in his life man is physically fully developed. At that moment his spirit and soul being ceases to be dependent on his bodily organs whose growth and development have come to an end. We are aware that from then on his spirit and soul become free of the body and develop independently. When we observe man as he is today we find that this moment occurs at a certain age—more will be said about this later—but one would be very much mistaken in believing that this occurrence took place in remotely the same way in the first postAtlantean cultural epoch.

During that ancient epoch man naturally passed through the ages of 6, 12, 20, 30, 40, 50 and so on, but through his whole life he experienced growing older differently from the way it is experienced today. During that epoch man felt, right up to a mature age, right up into the years from 48 to 56, the dependence of his spirit-soul being on his physical-bodily nature. He felt this to an extent which today is the case only in childhood and early youth. You must realize what this meant; it meant that while the body was growing man felt the soul's participation in the body's growth and development right up to the age of 35. After that he began to experience the soul's participation in the body's decline. He felt his soul's dependence on the body's evolution. While at first the body would be in a condition of growth and development, it would gradually come into a condition of decline. Because modern man's spirit-soul being is comparatively independent of his bodily nature, he does not notice when the decline begins. In the first post-Atlantean epoch those who reached this age felt with the decline of the body a universal spirituality becoming free within them.

The fact that the bodily nature began to decline while the soul was still dependent on it caused the spirit to light up within man. Immediately after the Atlantean catastrophe this condition lasted right up to the age of 56. Only then one might say was man fully developed; only then did his spirit-soul being cease to be dependent on the bodily nature. That there were at that time echoes of inner spiritual vision was because man's spirit and soul participated in the bodily nature during its decline. This condition and quality of human life threw its light over the whole culture. Young people were aware, because it was common knowledge and experience, that when they grew old, when they reached a venerable age, divine secrets would reveal themselves in their souls. This was the reason that there existed in that first post-Atlantean cultural epoch a veneration, a worship of old age of which today we can have no idea unless we perceive it in the spiritual echoes remaining from that ancient time. After all the things already said I need hardly mention that those who died before they had reached that patriarchal age knew of a world other than the physical-material one. They knew: In that world, those who died young had other tasks to accomplish together with higher beings of soul and spirit. Thus everyone, also when they died before reaching old age, still had a satisfying view of life and the world.

The remarkable fact is that when these things are investigated one cannot speak of mankind becoming older; curiously enough one must say mankind becomes ever younger, that it goes back towards youth. Immediately after the Atlantean catastrophe man developed, in the way I have described, up to the age of 56, then followed the time when he did so up to the age of 55, then 54 and so on. When the first post-Atlantean cultural epoch came to an end, development lasted only up to the age of 48. At that point man had as it were to say to himself: I am now on my own, my bodily nature no longer contributes to the development of my soul and spirit. And, as we have seen, this now occurred much earlier than at the start of the ancient Indian cultural epoch.

We then come to the second, the ancient Persian epoch. This epoch corresponds to the phase the individual passes through between 48 and 42. In other words in this epoch man felt his spirit and soul being's development to be dependent on his bodily nature up into his forties. Only when he was beyond the forties did he experience that independence from the body which at the present time occurs at a much earlier age. This meant that in the ancient Persian epoch the soul did not participate for so long, nor as intensely, in the decline, the sclerosis of the organism. The soul did not participate for so long in those forces that arose from the declining organism and that could lead man into the spiritual world, illumining it for him.

After the ancient Persian cultural epoch followed the one we designate as the Egyptian-Chaldean epoch. Now mankind's age as a whole dropped to what corresponds in the individual to the years between 42 and 35. That meant that in the Egyptian-Chaldean epoch the fruit of development came to man of itself in the beginning up to the age of 42, then 41, later 40 and so on. After that he had to accomplish his own independent inner development.

These facts appear to have the greatest significance for the fourth, the Graeco-Latin epoch. In this epoch mankind as a whole developed so that the age of post-Atlantean humanity corresponded successively to that of the individual between 35 and 28. These are the years leading up to the middle of life. We must be quite clear about what occurred in the Graeco-Latin epoch. The individual human being within this epoch experienced, simply through the laws governing mankind's evolution, his spirit-soul being's dependence on the body's growth and development. But just at the time when the body's decline set in, when it began to become sclerotic—if I may use that expression, which of course is somewhat radical—the soul became free from the body. The first half of life made a person belong to the Graeco-Latin culture by virtue of mankind's evolution in general. During this epoch the evolution of the individual coincided so exactly with mankind's evolution as a whole that, at the moment when human beings began to experience the decline of the body, nothing more was revealed to man through it. That is why so much of Greek culture reveals youthfulness, vitality and flourishing growth. However, what can be revealed only through the bodily nature in its decline eluded the Greek. This meant that such revelations were lost to him unless he received spiritual instruction in the mysteries. Direct vision of the spiritual world was lost through human nature itself.

In the third epoch simply through his nature it was possible for man to see into the spiritual world, though in decreasing measure. It was possible for him through direct vision to know about the soul's immortality. In the GraecoLatin epoch man could indeed know that everything growing, flourishing, everything coming into being is permeated with soul and spirit. But the soul's independent life after death, or before it had entered physical life through birth, was no longer obvious to the Greek simply through human evolution as such. That is the reason for the well-known saying expressed by the Greek heroes: “It is better to be a beggar in the upper world than a king in the realm of the shades.”¹

The Greeks knew through direct vision that the “upper world” and man within it was permeated by soul and spirit. It was just because of this vision that the spiritual world as such eluded them. It is interesting that the eminent Greek sage Aristotle developed his ideas precisely on this fundamental view of the Greeks. The great Aristotle scholar Franz Brentano² was right when he said that Aristotle's view of immortality was that after death man was no longer a complete human being. As a Greek, Aristotle had the view I have described, and he therefore presupposed that for a human being to be complete, body and soul must be together. Those like Aristotle who were not initiated in the mysteries said: If a man's arm is cut off, he is no longer a complete human being; if both arms are cut off, he is even less complete; if the whole body is taken from him as happens in death, then he is truly no longer a complete man. This view is certainly not true in the light of higher knowledge; it originated with the Greeks, even with those whose thinking, as in the case of Aristotle, had reached the highest eminence. After the soul has gone through death, man, according to Aristotle, is incomplete because he lacks organs that could bring him into communication with any kind of environment. Brentano rightly recognized that this was Aristotle's view of immortality.

Now bear in mind that during this epoch mankind in general passed through the ages which correspond in the individual to those between 35 and 28. If we take the first third of this time span we come to about the age of 33. The fourth post-Atlantean epoch began in the year 747 before the Mystery of Golgotha, and ended in the year 1413 after the Mystery of Golgotha. If evolution had continued as it had up to the fourth epoch, with mankind unavoidably becoming younger and younger, then man would have experienced not just the shadow-like immortality which the Greeks visualized. His spirit-soul being would at an ever earlier age cease to be dependent on the body. This independence would happen long before his bodily growth and development had ceased, and before he had reached the middle of life. As mankind in general attained no more than the age of 34, then 33, 32 and so on, the body would gradually have overwhelmed him. Through his individual evolution he would no longer have been able to look up to any kind of spiritual world. That is why it is of such immense significance that at the end of the first third of the epoch which began in 747 B.C. the Mystery of Golgotha took place, and that just at this point in time Christ Jesus reached the age of 33 which at that time was also the age of mankind. At that point the death on Golgotha took place. Christ Jesus had evolved so that His age and that of mankind coincided at the moment when, through the Mystery of Golgotha, the possibility arose for knowledge of immortality to be obtained directly without any physical intermediary. This knowledge can be attained on earth only because of the fructification the earth received when the Christ Spirit united with the personality of Jesus, just when His age and that of mankind coincided at the moment in time when mankind was threatened with loss of all connection with the spiritual world.

It affects one deeply when, in considering mankind's evolution as such with quite different assumptions, one discovers during spiritual investigation the deep connection between mankind's earthly evolution and the age and death of Christ Jesus. I can think of little which must have a greater impact on the soul than knowledge of the placement of the Mystery of Golgotha within an important law of development governing the individual person and the evolution of humanity as a whole. We see how spiritual knowledge gradually explains and illumines the Mystery of Golgotha. And we can perhaps sense that as spiritual science continues to widen and develop conscientious investigations, it will throw light on many more aspects of this event. It is certain that as yet we on earth, even with the penetrating research of spiritual science, grasp the Mystery of Golgotha only to the smallest extent. The Mystery of Golgotha will be understood ever more and at ever deeper levels the further mankind progresses in spiritual knowledge. I venture to say that during my spiritual research, few moments have been more moving than when—let me put it in these words—there arose for me, out of the grey mist of the spirit, the recognition of the connection between mankind's age of 33 in the fourth post-Atlantean epoch and the age of 33 of Christ Jesus just when the death on Golgotha took place.

Continuing mankind's post-Atlantean evolution we come to our own, the fifth epoch. During this epoch the age of mankind in general corresponds to the ages of the individual between the 28th and the 21st year. This means that when the fifth post-Atlantean epoch began in 1413, mankind's evolution had reached the point when people felt their spirit-soul being's development to be dependent upon their bodily nature up to their 28th year. At that age the soul became independent. You will realize from this fact the necessity for man in this epoch to attain through conscious inner spiritual development what the soul no longer receives through its dependence on the physical-bodily nature. In this epoch man must attain insight out of his own individual being, he must be able freely and independently to grasp reality and carry this ability beyond the ages of 28, 27, 26 and so on. However, it has to be said that generally the present system of education, despite being a much discussed or perhaps I should better say fabled about subject, tends not to provide the individual with anything beyond what corresponds to mankind's present age of 27.

In the course of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch mankind's general age will drop to 26, then 25, etc. reaching 21 at the end of the epoch. So you see the necessity for science of the spirit, which will provide the soul with what it no longer receives through the body's development, and will support it in its independent development. At present we witness the phenomenon that, if their development does not go beyond what it can receive from the external world and ordinary history, people may live to be a hundred, but their age remains at 27. That means that whatever they express about their innermost views, observations, or ideals always bears the stamp of issuing from someone aged no more than 27.

I have concerned myself with the most varied personalities engaged in different branches of cultural and public life. I have indeed considered this aspect of research most thoroughly. I have attempted to discover what lies behind some of the more questionable phenomena that one meets with today. It has come to light that much of what is happening has its origin in the fact that people with influence in public life, no matter how old they are, act out of the mental disposition of a 27-year-old, in the sense I have described. Truly what I am about to say is not said out of bad feeling or animosity. The research into these things goes back to long before the war, as can be seen from my lectures.

I did research into a personality who is typical because as far as his soul disposition is concerned it must be said that, though he is considerably older externally, inwardly he is but 27 years old. In his activity in public life he proves himself a typical representative of such a personality. There are many examples to choose from, but let us take this more distant one through whom much has come about in our time: Woodrow Wilson, the President of the United States of America. I have taken great pains in investigating this man's soul disposition. He represents those human beings whose development gains nothing through the fact that man's soul has become free, has become independent of the bodily nature and should be self-reliant. In consequence their age remains the same as that of mankind, which at present is 27. It is really an untruth when such people claim to be 30, 40, 50 or more years old. As regards inner development they are no more than 27.

A friend of our movement who has suffered much through the events taking place at present heard the lecture I am now giving in Munich. He told me afterwards that this explanation of the peculiarity of present events was like a ray of light helping him to understand many phenomena. The abstract ideals of youth, the abstract discussions about freedom, indulging one's own pleasure while believing to have a world mission; all these things are characteristic of Woodrow Wilson.^3NoteNum Not developing beyond the age of 27 explains his unpractical views, his inability to discover fruitful ideas that relate to reality as a creative force, his wishing to express only views that please people, that are intelligible in general to people who do not want any ideas more mature than those coming from a 27-year-old—these are also things that are characteristic of Woodrow Wilson. To take an example: his ideas about peace, which have swept through the world, are so impractical that they have contributed to war for his own country. All these things are closely related but they have their origin in the facts I have indicated. Spiritual research discovers deeper truths of human evolution which are not comfortable to hear. This no doubt accounts for them being so little appreciated. People are not consciously aware that such truths can be disagreeable, but subconsciously they are, and they fear them. The fear is subconscious and because people do not allow it to rise into consciousness it turns into hate, into antipathy against the deeper truths. What today calls forth so much antipathy towards spiritual science is subconscious hatred, and especially subconscious fear of the deeper truths which indeed are not, let us say, so digestible as those phrases so loved today such as “The best man in the right place,” and the like. In the future man's ideas as well as his ideals must be far more definite, far more concrete; they must relate to reality, to facts as they are. I have spoken of this from the most varied standpoints. Ideas and ideals must spring from real knowledge, from true insight into the meaning and direction of man's evolution. Man's evolution will indeed not prosper as long as people refuse to base what is called “idealism” on direct spiritual investigation. Arbitrary notions will not provide ideals that have any connection with reality.

The sixth epoch will follow our own. As mankind's general age will then correspond to the ages of the individual between 21 and 14, it will mean that man's soul will become free and independent of his bodily nature at those earlier ages. Imagine what it will then be like if man's free and independent soul does not unite with knowledge derived from spiritual investigation. A person may then be 30, 40, 50 years old, but if he has not taken his own development in hand, his age will in fact be no more than 17, 16 or 15. The all-important aspect of mankind's further evolution consists in the fact that as the earth progresses more of man's development is left to the individual himself. What will happen if this is not recognized? What will happen is that people will suffer dementia praecox, insanity of adolescence. You will realize how necessary it is to know about the fundamental facts of earthly existence and to be conscious of the dangers that threaten mankind. At present there is plenty of courage shown in external action, a fact which is by no means always sufficiently appreciated. But man's further progress will need courage of soul, the courage which will enable him to face truths which at first appear disagreeable if one's first love in life is ease and comfort, if all one strives for is knowledge that one finds, as the saying is, “elevating,” i.e., one demands all truths to be pleasant ones. This is an attitude that is very widespread in our time. A dislike is taken to someone the moment he speaks about things that are uncomfortable, albeit necessary; one feels let down because he fails to uplift. But truth which has been recognized as such stands higher than words spoken merely because they deal with things that are pleasant and can be taken home to be enjoyed like a comforting beverage. The satisfaction derived from knowledge of life as it necessarily and truly is stands higher than that derived from ease and comfort.

These are things I wanted to say to help us understand our present age.

• 1. “It is better to be a beggar ...” Homer, Odyssey, eleventh book, verses 289-291; the speech of Achilles.
• 2. Franz Brentano, 1838–1917, professor in Vienna 1874–1880; Psychologie vom empirischen Standpunkte, Bd. I, 1874.
• 3. NoteText
• NoteNum. Woodrow Wilson, 1856–1924, President of the United States from 1913-1921, professor of philosophy.

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.

Today, my task will be to contribute further to the fundamental theme in our quest to understand the problems of our time. It is justifiably required that man should be awake, and pay due heed to the many spiritual influences that affect and transform him over comparatively short periods of time, and also that he acquaint himself with what must be done to further the particular spiritual and cultural impulses at work in our time.

I have tried from various viewpoints to draw your attention to the greater post-Atlantean period, by describing wider aspects as well as details from it, because only our understanding of that period makes our own comprehensible. To allow the whole of mankind's post-Atlantean evolution to work upon us awakens understanding for our own time.

I want today to speak about that same period by bringing before you some different characteristic aspects. However, in order to understand what I want to describe I must ask you to bear in mind what has been said about humanity as such becoming ever younger and younger. I described how, immediately after the Atlantean catastrophe, mankind's age was 56 and that by now it has dropped to 27. This means that modern man develops naturally up to that age. After the age of 27 he develops further only if he cultivates impulses received directly from the spirit out of his own inner initiative. So let us turn our attention to how the 27 year old human being of today came to be as he is.

Let us look back once more to the time immediately after the great Atlantean catastrophe. I have pointed out how very different, compared with today, man's social feelings and in fact his whole social structure then were. I would like to draw special attention to the unique soul constitution of the first post-Atlantean people, particularly of those in the southern part of Asia, and also remind you of certain facts, already known to you from my writings, about that ancient Indian culture. There was at that time a complete absence of what modern man can hardly imagine a social structure without, namely the concepts of laws and rights. You will be aware of the immense importance attached to these and related concepts today. Things of this nature were never mentioned; they were unknown in the first postAtlantean epoch. It would have been impossible at that time to imagine what might be meant by laws and rights, whereas we cannot visualize society without them. When guidance was needed concerning what ought to be done or left undone, or about arrangements to be made either in public or private life, one turned to the patriarchs, i.e., to those who had reached their fifties.

It was assumed, because it was self-evident, that those who had reached their fifties were able to recognize what ought to be done. They had this ability because people remained capable of development in the natural sense like children right into their fifties, by which time they had also attained in the same natural way a certain worldly maturity. No one disputed the fact that people of that age were wise and knew how life should be arranged and human affairs conducted. It would never have occurred to anybody to doubt that people who had developed normally into their fifties would know the right answers to life's problems. When a human being today, in the course of his natural development, reaches puberty, a change takes place in his inner being. In that ancient time inner revelations came to people in their mature years, simply because natural development continued until late in life, the consequence of which were the capabilities I have indicated. Thus, when advice was needed, one consulted the natural lawgivers, the elders, the wise ones.

Why exactly did they have this extraordinary wisdom? The reason they were so wise was that they experienced themselves at one with the spirit, more particularly with the spirits that live in light. Today we sense the warmth in our environment; we are aware of the air as we breathe it in and out; we sense a force in water as it evaporates to come down again as rain, but we experience this only physically, through our senses. The people of the first post-Atlantean epoch did not experience things that way. When they were in their fifties, they felt the spirit in warmth, in currents of air, in circulating water. They did not just experience the wind blowing but the spirits of wind; not just warmth but the spirit of warmth; when they looked at water, they saw also the water spirits. This caused them, when they had reached a certain age, to listen to the revelations of these elemental spirits, though only in certain states of wakefulness. What the elemental spirits revealed to them formed the basis for the wisdom they were able to impart to others. When people who had reached that age had gone through normal development, they were geniuses; in fact, they were much more than what we understand by genius.

Today a child's soul development reveals itself gradually up to a certain age while the body's development takes place. In those days something similar happened in old age when wisdom arose from the bodily nature itself. It came about because many not only developed naturally during the body's thriving growth, but continued to do so during its decline when it became sclerotic and mineralized. The body's forces of decline, its calcification, caused the soul and spirit to develop, and this was bound up with another aspect of evolution. If you imagine vividly what I shall now describe, you will find it easy to understand. People who had reached the age when the body began to decline, clearly perceived the beings of the elements. At night the normal senses enabled man to perceive not only the stars but also imaginations. He saw the spiritual aspect of the starry sky. I have often drawn attention to old star maps with their curious figures. These figures are not as modern science would have it—creations of fantasy—but originate from direct perception.

Thus the ancients, the wise ones, were able to give counsel and regulate the social structure through what they directly perceived. They had an intimate relationship with that part of the earth they inhabited because they perceived its spiritual content. They perceived spirituality in the water that issued from it, in the air surrounding it, in the climatic conditions of warmth and so on. But these interrelationships differed from place to place. In Greece they were different from those in India and different again from those in Persia and so on. As a consequence the wise ones, the sages, had perceptions that were related to the particular section of the earth which they occupied. The ancient Indian culture developed the way it did through the relationships prevailing in that part of the earth. Likewise there arose in Greece a culture specifically related to the elements in that part. These differences were experienced quite concretely.

Today something similar is experienced only in regard to the human being. We would regard it as grotesque were it suggested that the ear could be situated where the nose is or vice versa. The whole organism is so formed that the nose could only be where it is and likewise the ear. However, the earth itself is an organism, but for that there is no longer any feeling or understanding. When a culture develops, it must of necessity have a certain physiognomy through the influence of the earth's elemental beings. What developed in ancient Greece could not have been transferred to ancient India or vice versa. What is so significant about ancient times is that cultures developed which reflected the earth's spiritual physiognomy. Nothing of this is known to man today because, when he reaches the age when he could know, his natural ability to develop ceases. People do not pause to wonder why it is that, when the white man immigrated to North America, the appearance of those who settled in the eastern part became different from that of those who settled in California. The expression in the eyes of the settlers in the east changed completely, and their hands became larger than they would have been in Europe; even the color of their skin changed. This applies only to the eastern part of America. The development of a civilization and its relationship to its part of the earth's organism is no longer taken into account. Man no longer knows what kind of spiritual entities, what kind of spiritual beings live in the elements of the earth. Man has become abstract; he no longer experiences things as they truly are.

What I have described applies to the first post-Atlantean epoch. Things changed in the following epoch, in the course of which mankind's age dropped to between 48 and 42. During this second post-Atlantean epoch the natural ability of the human being to develop lasted only into his forties. Therefore he did not attain the kind of wisdom he had attained in the first epoch. His soul-spirit being remained dependent on the bodily nature only in his forties. The ability to sense his relationship with the elements became weaker. However, the ability was still there, only weakened. People now became aware that when they were outside the body during sleep, they were in the spiritual world. They became aware of this once they had reached, their forties. They also became aware that when they awoke and plunged into the body once more, the spiritual world became dark. The teaching about Ormuzd and Ahriman, about Light and Darkness, originated from this experience. Man was aware that he was in the spiritual world during sleep, and he experienced the descent into the body as a descent into darkness. There was no longer the close dependence on the piece of land one inhabited; instead, there was an experience of participating in night and day. The constellations of stars were still seen pictorially through the faculty of imagination. This atavistic ability had remained from the time of Atlantis and enabled man to know that he had a living soul and that during sleep he was in a spiritual world which he could experience through imagination.

In the third, the Egyptian-Chaldean epoch, the ability to experience oneself so completely at one with the whole cosmos receded still further. In Persia it had been taught by Zarathustra, but had in general been known through tradition. During the Egyptian-Chaldean cultural epoch, in the course of normal evolution, man's sense perception became stronger while the old spiritual perception became weaker. As a consequence the main form of worship in the third epoch was a star cult. Earlier, in Persia there had been no star cults; the spiritual world had been experienced directly through imagination and music of the spheres. In the third epoch things were more interpreted rather than seen directly; the pictorial aspect became fainter. A proper star cult developed because the stars were clearly seen.

Then came the fourth epoch when the surrounding spiritual world had faded from man's consciousness. Only the physical aspect of the stars was perceived; the world was seen more or less as we see it. I have already described how man experienced the world in ancient Greece. That the soul lives in the body and expresses itself through the body—of this the Greeks were aware, but they no longer felt to the same extent that the cosmos was the soul's true home. I have often referred to Aristotle who, because he was not initiated, could not perceive the spiritual aspect of the stars; instead he founded a philosophy of the world of stars. He interpreted what he saw physically. His interpretation was based on his awareness that man's soul resides in the body between birth and death. He was also aware in a philosophical sense, that the soul has its home in that outermost sphere in which, for Aristotle, the highest God held sway, while lesser Gods held sway in the nearer spheres. He also evolved a philosophy of the elements, of earth, water, air, and fire or warmth; it was, however, philosophy, not experience. No philosophy of the elements had existed before when they were still directly perceived and experienced. By the fourth epoch it had all changed; mankind had been truly driven from the spiritual world. The time had come when something had to intervene: the Mystery of Golgotha.

In these lectures I have pointed to the deep significance of the Mystery of Golgotha. I explained that by the time it took place mankind's age had dropped to 33; man's natural development proceeded only up to that age, and Christ, in the body of Jesus of Nazareth, experienced just that age. A truly wondrous coincidence! As I have described, immediately after the Atlantean catastrophe man remained capable of natural development right up to the age of 56, then 55, later 54 and so on. At the beginning of the second epoch this ability lasted only up to the age of 48, then 47 and so on. At the beginning of the third, the Egyptian-Chaldean epoch it lasted only to the age of 42, receding to the age of 36. The Graeco-Latin epoch began in the year of 747 B.C. when man retained the ability of natural development only up to the age of 35, then 34 and when it receded to the age of 33 then—because this age is below 35 when the body begins to decline—man could no longer experience the cosmic spirit's union with the soul. Therefore, the spirit that is the Christ Spirit approached man from outside. You see how essential was the Christ Spirit's entry into mankind's evolution.

Let us look back once more to the patriarchs in ancient times who were, one might say, super-geniuses. They were consulted on all questions concerning the arrangement of human affairs because their natural inner development enabled them to embody the divine-spiritual element. The possibility of receiving higher counsel from human beings diminished ever more. When mankind's age receded to 33, Christ had to come from other worlds and enter the body of Jesus of Nazareth. Man had to receive from a different direction the impulse which through his natural evolution he had lost.

This allows us deep insight into the indispensable connection between mankind's evolution and the Mystery of Golgotha. Science of the spirit reveals Christ's entry into human evolution as an inherent necessity. The need for new insight and deeper understanding of the Christ Impulse can be seen at every turn.

I recommend you read the latest number of Die Tat (The Deed), for it contains much of interest. You will find an article by our revered friend Dr. Rittelmeyer¹ and also one of the last articles written by our dear friend Deinhard before his death.² In this same number there is also an article by Arthur Drews which is significant because here he again discusses the role of Christ Jesus in the modern world.³ I have often spoken about Drews. He came to the fore in Berlin at the time when the attempt was made, from the so-called monistic viewpoint to prove, among other things, that Jesus of Nazareth could not be a historical person. Two books appeared concerned with what was called the “Christ Myth” to show that it cannot be proved historically that a Jesus of Nazareth ever lived.

This time Drews discusses Christ Jesus from an odd point of view. In the June number of Die Tat you will find an article entitled “Jesus Christ and German Piety.” He builds up the peculiar idea of a piety that is German; this is just about as clever as to speak of a German sun or a German moon. To bring national differences into these things is really as nonsensical as it would be to speak of the sun or moon being exclusively German; yet such absurdities attract large audiences these days. It is interesting that Drews, who would not dream of evoking Eckart,⁴ Tauler⁵ or Jacob Boehme,⁶ here does evoke Fichte,⁷ although normally he would not do so even if philosophical matters were discussed. He takes the greatest trouble in his attempt to justify his idea of German piety, and also to show that, especially if one is German, the truth about Jesus Christ cannot be arrived at through theology or historical study, but only through what he calls German metaphysics. And says Drews, no historical Christ Jesus can be found through metaphysics.

Drews' whole approach is closely connected with what I have drawn to your attention in these lectures, that the only concept of God modern man can reach is that of the Father God. The name of Christ is interspersed in the writings of Harnack,⁸ but what he describes is the Father God. What is usually called the inner mystical path can lead only to a general Godhead. Christ cannot be found in either Tauler or Eckart. It is a different matter when we come to Jacob Boehme, but the difference is not understood by Drews. In Boehme the Christ can be found for it is of Him that he speaks. Christ is to be found neither in Arthur Drews' writings nor in Adolf Harnack's theology, but Drews is, from the modern point of view, the more honest. He seeks the Christ and does not find Him, because that is impossible through abstract metaphysics held aloof from historical facts. But the real facts of history can, as we have seen, enable us to understand the significance even of the age of Christ Jesus in relation to the Mystery of Golgotha. Drews fails to find Christ because he remains at abstract metaphysics, which is the only standpoint acceptable today. Certainly, the healthy person can through metaphysics find a general God but not Christ. It is an outlook that is directly connected with what I explained, that atheism is really an illness, the inability to find Christ a misfortune, not to be able to find the spirit a soul blindness. Drews cannot do otherwise than say, “What is discovered through metaphysics cannot honestly be called Christ; we must therefore leave Christ out of our considerations.” Drews believes he is speaking out of the spirit of our time, and so he is inasmuch as our time rejects spiritual science. He believes he is speaking the truth when he says that religion must be based on metaphysics, and therefore cannot, if it is honest, entertain any concept of Christ.

Let us now turn to the actual words with which Drews ends his extraordinary article: “Every historical tradition”—he means traditions depicting Christ historically—“is an obstacle to religion; as soon as the great work of reformation, only just begun by Luther, is completed, the last remnant of any faith based on history will be swept away from religious consciousness.”

I have often mentioned that spiritual science seeks to establish a faith based on history because it provides a concrete impetus towards the spiritual aspect of evolution which leads as directly to Christ as abstract metaphysics leads to an undifferentiated God. Drews says, “German religion must be either a religion without Christ or no religion at all.” That expresses more or less what I have often indicated, namely that the present-day consciousness is bound to remove Christ unless it comes through spiritual science to a concrete grasp of the spiritual world and thereby rekindles understanding of Christ.

Drews continues:

When one recognizes God and man to be essentially the same, [Imagine, to suggest, as is done here, that God and man are the same!] when every person is seen to have a natural tendency to become a “Christ”; i.e., to become a God-man, then there will be no room for a Jesus Christ. One can certainly draw attention to acts attributed to Christ in order to elucidate and illustrate certain religious procedures, as for example mystics have done. One can also refer to sayings of Christ to make one's own opinions clear, just as one can refer to words and doings of other outstanding individuals.

Here we have the peculiar situation that what is said never to have existed is yet referred to as if it had. On the one hand Drews sets out to prove that Christ never was, and on the other he says that it is permissible to refer to His words and deeds in order to elucidate one's own. He continues:

“German” religion of the God-man has no use for a historical redeemer or even for an exceptional human being who, like Jesus, haunts our liberal theologians. It needs no symbolic representative who only serves to confuse the issue. Such a symbol must be recognized as superfluous and even dangerous because it introduces into our “German” concept of religion not only an alien element which, however sublime, is nevertheless onesided, but also unacceptable Protestant ethics. It is this which has caused modern man's alienation from Christianity. Furthermore, such imposed ethics contradict the duties, so deeply felt at the present time, placed upon us by our own nature.

This is certainly a passage of which I can make no proper sense. How is one to come to terms with the way modern man thinks? That is something difficult to understand when one's own thoughts relate to reality. Drews continues:

All that is great and significant in the Gospels is not lost to mankind even if there never was a Jesus. The words attributed to him would then have come from some other source. In any case, our salvation cannot be dependent on whether there was a Jesus or not. Regarding Jesus as principle of salvation draws in its wake not only the whole dualistic metaphysics of Palestinian Judaism, which is incompatible with the modern spirit, but also makes religion inseparable from history. It introduces vague opinions and brings forward doubtful historical events as proof of external religious manifestations. The “German” religion of the God-man is not only a religion of freedom, but a religion of the most individual and deepest inwardness. It will no sooner have entered life than we shall be free both of external Church functions with their subsidiary demands, but also of Jesus Christ. As Fichte said: “It is through metaphysics, not history, that salvation is obtained! And metaphysics knows of no Jesus Christ.”

It would be well if people become conscious of the fact that without spiritual knowledge modern education leads logically to such a conclusion. To present a different result would be a compromise and therefore dishonest. If this were recognized spiritual science would not be seen as something arbitrarily introduced at the present time, but as the answer to the deepest and truest needs of the human soul.

Since the year 1413 after the Mystery of Golgotha, man has lived in the fifth post-Atlantean epoch during which through human evolution he becomes ever more estranged from the spiritual world. We can find our connection with spirituality only through impulses that are no longer provided by man's bodily nature but are innate in the soul itself. People today succumb to the kind of abstractions I have described because as yet they are not sufficiently permeated by Christianity to sense the soul's necessity of union with the spiritual world. That is why nowadays all concepts, all ideas are abstract. Truly they go together—today's unchristian attitude and the unreality and abstraction of ideas. Indeed our concepts and ideas will remain unreal unless we learn to permeate them once more with the spirit, the spirit in which Christ lives. Through Him our concepts will again become as living and real as those of the ancient Indian patriarchs who through their personalities made concrete and effective what was instituted as rights and laws. Our rights and laws are themselves abstract. When a bridge is built and it collapses, one soon realizes that its construction was based on wrong concepts. In society such connections are not so easily detected; all kinds of incompetence may be practiced. The result reveals itself only in the unhappiness people suffer in times such as ours. When a bridge collapses, one blames the engineer who built it. When misfortune overtakes mankind because the inadequate concepts of those in charge are incapable of intervening in events, then one blames all kinds of things. However, what ought to be blamed, or rather recognized, is the circumstance that we are going through a crisis in which people no longer have any true sense as to whether a concept has any connection with reality or not.

I would like to give you an example taken from external nature to illustrate once more the distinction between concepts that are connected with reality and those that are not. If you take a crystal and think of it as a hexagonal prism, closed above and below by hexagonal pyramids, then you have a concept of a quartz crystal that is connected with the reality, because that is true of the crystal's form and existence. If on the other hand you form a concept of a flower without roots, you have an unreal concept, for without roots a flower cannot live, cannot have an existence in reality. Someone who does not strive to make his thoughts correspond to reality will regard the flower torn off at the stem as just as real as the quartz crystal, but that is untrue. It is not possible for someone who thinks in accordance with reality to form a mental picture of a flower without roots. People will have to learn anew to form concepts that correspond to reality. A tree which has been uprooted is no longer a reality to which the concept tree corresponds. To feel the uprooted tree as a reality is to feel an untruth, for it cannot live, but withers and dies if not rooted in the earth. There you have the difference.

No one whose thinking corresponds to reality could suggest, as professor Dewar does, that it is possible to calculate by means of experiments how the world will end.⁹ Such speculations are always unreal. It must become habit to train one's thinking to correspond to things as they truly are, otherwise one's thoughts about the spiritual world will be mere fantasy. One must be able to distinguish the concept of a living entity from that of a lifeless one, otherwise one cannot have true concepts of the spiritual world. One's thoughts remain unreal if a tree without roots, or a geological stratum by itself—for it can exist only if there are other strata lying below as well as above—is regarded as true reality. Those who think the way geologists or physicists and especially biologists do are not formulating real thoughts. Biologists think of a tooth, for example, as if it could exist on its own. Today, spiritual science apart, it is only in the realm of art—though not in pure realism—that one finds any understanding for the fact that the reality or unreality of something can depend on whether that to which it belongs is present or not.

These examples are taken from the external physical world, but today other spheres, such as national economy and political science in particular, suffer from unreal thoughts. I have pointed out the impossibility of the political science outlined by Kjellen in his book The State as a Form of Life.¹⁰ You know that I have great respect for Kjellen. His book is both widely read and highly praised, but if some aspect of natural science had been written about in a similar way, the author would have been laughed at. One may get away with writing in that way about the state, but not about a crocodile. Not a single concept in Kjellen's book is thought through realistically.

It is essential that man develop a sense for the kind of thoughts that do relate to reality; only then will he be able to recognize the kind of concepts and ideas capable of bringing order into society. Just think how essential it is that we acquire concepts enabling us to understand people living on Russian soil. Remarkably little is done to reach such understanding. What is thought about the Russian people, whether here or in the West or in Central Europe, is very far from the truth. A few days ago I read an article which suggested that Russians still have to some extent the more mystical approach to life of the Middle Ages, whereas since then in the West and in Central Europe intellectuality has become widespread. The article makes it clear that the Russian people should begin to acquire the intellectuality which other European peoples have had the good fortune to attain. The writer concerned has not the slightest inkling that the character of the Russian people is utterly different. People nowadays are not inclined to study things as they truly are. The sense is lacking for the reality, the truth, contained in things.¹¹

One of our friends made the effort to bring together what I have written about Goethe in my books with what I said in a lecture concerning human and cosmic thoughts.¹² From this material he produced a book in Russian, a remarkable book already published.¹³ I am convinced it will be widely read in Russia by a certain section of the public. Were it to be translated into German or any other European language, people would find it deadly boring. This is because they lack the sense for appreciating the finely chiseled thoughts, the wonderful conceptual filigree work that makes this book so striking.

What is so remarkable about the Russian character is that as it evolves something will emerge which is different from what has emerged in the rest of Europe where mysticism and intellectuality exist, as it were, apart. In Russia a mysticism will appear which is intellectual in character and an intellectuality which is based on mysticism. Thus it will be something quite new, intellectual mysticism, mystical intellectuality and, if I may put it so, quite equal to its task. This is something that is not understood at all. It is there nevertheless, though hidden within the chaos of Eastern Europe, and will emerge expressing the characteristics I have briefly indicated.

These things can be understood only if one has a feeling for the reality inherent in ideas. To acquire this sense, this feeling that ideas are realities is one of the most urgent needs of the present time. Without it abstract programs will continue to be devised, beautiful political speeches held about all kinds of measures to be taken which prove unproductive, though they need not be. Nor can there be any feeling for events in history which when followed up, can be an immense help when it comes to understanding our own time.

Let me give you a characteristic example. Concern about the problems facing mankind at the present time causes one to turn repeatedly to events that took place in the 18th century, particularly in the '60s of that century. At that time remarkable impulses were emerging in Europe. An attempt to understand them can be most instructive. As you know that was when the Seven Years War took place. England and France were deeply divided, mainly through their colonial rivalry in North America. In Europe, England and Prussia were allies; opposing them was the alliance consisting of France and Austria. In Russia a strong hostility prevailed against Prussia during the reign of Czarina Elizabeth. Therefore one should really speak of an alliance between Russia, France and Austria against Prussia and England. One could say that on a smaller scale conditions were similar to those of today; just as now there was then a danger of complete chaos in Europe. In fact, when the situation in the early 1760s is investigated, it is found to be not unlike the present one in 1917. But the remarkable incident I want to mention is the following.

I believe it was on January the fifth, 1762, that Czarina Elizabeth died; or to put it as the historians have done, her life, not very often sober, had come to an end; she had spent most of it inebriated. The Czarina Elizabeth was dead, and her nephew, her sister's son, stood before those authorized to place the crown upon his head. It was an extraordinary person who, on January the fifth 1762, prepared himself to be elevated to Czar. He was clad in his regiment's ceremonial uniform, consisting of green jacket with red collar and cuffs, yellow waistcoat and stockings, leggings to above the knee (he had already as Grand Duke made a habit of never bending the knees when walking as this, to him, seemed more dignified) long pigtail, two powdered coils, a hat with upturned brim, and as his symbol he carried a knobbed staff. As you know, his consort was Catherine, later to become Catherine the Great. History describes Czar Peter III as an immature young man.¹⁴ It is extraordinarily difficult to ascertain what kind of person he actually was. Very probably he was very immature, even backward. He became Czar at a significant moment in the history of Europe. At his side was a woman who already as a seven year old girl had written in her diary that there was nothing she desired more than to become the absolute ruler of the Russian people. Her dream was to become ruler in her own right. And she seemed to be proud that for the sake of direct succession she need never bear a child that was necessarily that of her husband, the Czar. When he became ruler, the war had been going on for a long time; everybody longed for peace. Peace would be a blessing if only it could be attained.

What happened next was that already in February—that is, soon after the feeble-minded Peter III had ascended to the throne of the Czars—all the European powers received a Russian manifesto. This event was very remarkable, and I would like to read to you a literal translation. The manifesto was sent to the embassies in Austria, France, Sweden and Saxony. Saxe-Coburg was at that time part of Poland. The document reads as follows:

His Imperial Majesty, who through good fortune ascended to the throne of his forebears, regards his first duty to be promotion and increase of the welfare of his subjects. It is therefore with great sorrow that he Witnesses the present war which has already lasted six years and is an immense burden to all the countries involved. Far from showing any signs of coming to an end, it is, to the misfortune of all the nations, spreading ever further the longer it lasts. The suffering of humanity through this calamity is all the greater because of the uncertainty concerning the outcome, which shows no sign of lessening. In these circumstances, out of humanitarian feelings and compassion for the useless spilling of innocent blood, his Imperial Majesty on his part wishes to put an end to this evil. He therefore finds it necessary to turn to Russia's allies reminding them that God's first commandment to sovereigns, namely the preservation of the people entrusted to them, must take precedence over all other considerations. They on their part would wish to secure the peace so necessary and valuable to them also, and at the same time to contribute as much as is possible to see peace established in the whole of Europe. To this purpose His Majesty is prepared to sacrifice the conquests made in this war by Russian forces. His Majesty hopes that the allies on their part will consider the return of peace a greater benefit than anything they could expect to obtain through a prolonged war and further bloodshed. Out of the best and deepest feelings his Imperial Majesty advises all to devote their best forces to achieve so great and beneficial an objective. St. Petersburg, February 23, 1762.

I do wonder if anywhere today there is a true feeling for the fact that this manifesto is absolutely concrete, is based completely on reality. One should be able to sense that it is a document that carries the conviction of truth. However, the diplomatic notes sent in answer to the manifesto are all declarations written more or less in the same vein as are today's declarations concerned with the entente, especially the ones sent by Woodrow Wilson. Everything in these diplomatic notes is utterly abstract with no relation to reality, whereas what I just now read to you, written on the 23rd of February 1762, is in a style of a different order, and contains something quite remarkable, all the more so in view of the Czar's condition, which I described to you. There must have been someone with power behind the scenes, with a sense for the reality of the situation, who could cause this action to be taken. Later, when the abstract replies had reached Russia—replies containing the same kind of abstractions as those used today, like “peace, free from annexation” or “freedom for the people”—Peter, the feeble-minded, sent an answer delivered by the Russian envoy, Count Gallitzin, to the Court in Vienna on the 9th of April. Listen to what it contains:

The friendship which has existed between the Russian Imperial Court and the Prussian Royal Court ever since the time of Czar Peter I has lately suffered a setback merely through accidental changes in the constitution of Europe. The war which is a result of these changes can neither last forever nor destroy the advantage of a friendship which for many years proved to be a useful confederation and could be so again. His Imperial Majesty therefore proposes to the King of Prussia that they conclude not only a lasting peace, but a treaty of alliance in their mutual interest and to their mutual advantage.

Please note the stroke of genius in what follows:

The reason for these deliberations on the part of his Russian Imperial Majesty is obvious and needs no lengthy explanation, as it is easy enough to demonstrate that no good can come of a general peace such as was concluded in Westphalia. Peace cannot be expected to last when there is an unending shifting of arms and such variety of intentions. Such a peace necessitates all conquered territories to be protected, as is the case in Westphalia. But now the matter hinges on pretentions which have only arisen out of the war. These can hardly be reconciled due to the eagerness early in the war to mobilize as many powers as possible with little consideration for possible consequences of hastily concluded treaties and amalgamations.

One cannot imagine a more ingenious diplomatic document. Think about it—if only somebody could recognize now that the pretentions made today have only arisen because of this war! The document continues:

The Russian Imperial Court alone has always insisted that, before a general congress is arranged, it is necessary that conflicting interests and demands are reconciled. It would appear that the Sovereign Court in Vienna also recognizes this, and therefore never directly answered the Russian Imperial communique. The Sovereign Court made only brief reference to points that were in its favor, passing over others in silence preferring, it would seem, to await possible fortunes with arms. ... The war that has since broken out between England and Spain only increases the general misery. Although it engages England at sea, it does nothing to lessen the war in Germany. Sweden is without hope and is suffering losses; her glory waning, she seems to have courage neither to continue the war nor to withdraw from it. The Sovereign Courts all appear to be waiting to see who will be the first to make a decisive move towards establishing peace. His Russian Imperial Majesty alone is ready to do so, through compassion and also in view of the complaisance shown by his majesty the King of Prussia. His Imperial Majesty wishes to take the necessary steps at the earliest possible moment, especially as this intention was communicated to all the Sovereign Courts as early as the 23rd of February, soon after the start of his reign.

Peace was established, and indeed as a result of what was initiated with this concrete document based on reality. It is of the greatest importance that a sense is developed for what history conveys, a feeling for the difference between concepts and ideas that are incapable of intervening in reality, and those that are themselves rooted deeply in reality and therefore have the power to affect it. One should not imagine that words are always mere words; they can be as effective as deeds if based on reality. It must be realized that mankind is going through a crisis. It is all-important that a new path, a new connection, be found to truth and reality. People are so alienated from what is real that they have lost the sense for truth and for the right way of dealing with things. It is important to see that the crisis we are in and the untruthfulness that abounds are related. Let me give you one small example: a periodical has appeared, calling itself The Invisible Temple, obviously a publication in which those inclined towards mysticism expect to find something very deep. “The Invisible Temple”—Oh, the depth of it! Subtitle? A Monthly Magazine for the Gathering of Spirits.¹⁵ I will say no more on that point, but in one issue monists and theosophists are mentioned. Various foolish things are said, including a passage I will read. The periodical is the mouthpiece for a society which is at present led by Horneffer.¹⁶ The society claims it is going to renew the world.

This is the passage:

Monists and theosophists may go in different directions; they may vigorously fight and despise one another; yet in one respect they are strangely alike. Both lay claim to the word “science.” Both insist that their pursuit is true science, and that everybody else's science is pseudo-science. You will find this stated in the writings of Haeckel as well as of Rudolf Steiner.

I request you to go through everything I have said or written and see if you can find anything of what is here maintained. But who today is prepared in a case like this to call something by its right name, and say that it is an outright lie, and a common one at that. That Horneffer should write such things comes as no surprise. When he published Nietzsche's works, I had to point out to him that he did not have the faintest understanding of Nietzsche. What he had compiled and published was rubbish. So what he writes now is no surprise. But people take such things seriously, and thus it comes about that the worst, most stupid foolishness is confused and mixed up with the earnest striving of spiritual science, and worse still, what is-truth is called lies, whereas lies are accepted as truth.

It must be learned that a new link to reality has to be found. In the first post-Atlantean cultural epoch the patriarchs when they reached their fifties, received the spirit into themselves as part of their natural development. We may ask if this has in any way remained through the Greek epoch up to our own? The answer is that all that has remained is what we call genius. When the faculty of genius appears today it is still to some extent dependent on man's natural development. However, the men of genius appearing during the fifth cultural epoch will be the last in earth evolution. It is important to know that no genius will appear in the future. We must face the fact that as a natural gift the faculty of genius will disappear. Instead, a new quality of originality will appear, a quality that no longer appears as a gift of nature but must be striven for. It will arise through man's intimate union with the spirituality that reveals itself in the outer world.

A very interesting man, a psychologist, died in March, 1917. I have often spoken about Franz Brentano.¹⁷ He was not only the most significant expert on Aristotle, but a characteristic thinker of our time. I have mentioned before that he began a work on psychology. The first volume appeared in 1874; the second was to appear that same fall and further volumes later. But neither the one expected in the fall nor any later volumes appeared. I became thoroughly familiar with Franz Brentano's characteristic way of lecturing when I lived in Vienna. I have read every published line of what he has written, so I am well acquainted with the direction of his thoughts. Because I know him so well I am convinced that Franz Brentano's innate honesty prevented him from publishing further volumes. There are clear indications already in the first volume of his struggle to reach a clear conclusion regarding immortality of the soul. However, without spiritual science—with which he would have nothing to do—he could not get beyond the first volume, let alone the fifth, in which he planned to furnish proof of the soul's immortality. There was no room for science of the spirit in his outlook. He is, in fact, the originator of the saying so much quoted by 19th-century philosophers: “Vera philosophiae methodus nulla alia nisi scientiae naturalis est” (”True science of the spirit can have no other method of research than natural science.”)¹⁸ He composed this sentence for his inauguration thesis when in 1866, having left the Dominican order, he became professor at the university at Wurzburg. Philosophy was already then rather scorned. The first time he entered the auditorium, where formerly a follower of Baader¹⁹ had lectured, he was met with slogans such as “sulfur factory” written on the walls.

Franz Brentano was a gifted man, and he worked out his chosen subject as far as it was possible for him to do. The reason he came to a standstill after the first volume of his intended work was his refusal to enter into spiritual science. His later writings are fragments. But one treatise, a rendering of one of his lectures, is extremely interesting. It is entitled Genius. Although he was a keen observer he was not someone able to ascend from physical observations to spiritual ones. The treatise is basically an attack on the idea of genius. He opposes the idea that from some unconscious strata of the soul could arise what is called genius. He argues that what comes to expression is just a quicker, more commanding grasp of things than is normally attained by ordinary people. As I said, Brentano's treatise is very interesting although he did not come to a spiritual-scientific viewpoint. He was a keen observer and for that very reason could not find, when observing life today, anything to justify the claim of genius. And because he was honest he opposed the idea.

The riddle of genius, among other things, remains inexplicable till one investigates the deeper aspects of mankind's evolution, unless one knows that in the future, what has been known as “genius” will be replaced in certain people by a new way of communion with the spiritual world. When they achieve this, they will receive impulses which will come to expression in the external world in ways that will be equivalent to what was created by geniuses in the past. To recognize that things were different in the past and will be different again in the future is to understand evolution rightly.

I know full well that one is ridiculed for saying such things, but they are the result of direct observation of concrete facts. They are also a contrast to the way people nowadays base their actions not on facts but on some idea with which they have become enamored. To give an example, a man concerned with healing got the idea that movement is good for certain illnesses, which is quite true. However, someone consulted him who had a complaint which the practitioner thought would benefit from movement. He recommended that the patient take plenty of exercise, to which he got the reply: “Forgive me, but you must have forgotten that I am a postman.” One must recognize that concepts are only the tool, not the reality, and also that one must never be dogmatic. I have sometimes referred to another unreal concept, frequently acted upon when it is said: “the best man in the right place!”—whereupon it is immediately found that one's nephew or son-in-law is the best man! What matters are the facts as they truly are, not the idea one is in love with. Unless a feeling for these things is acquired one will fail to learn what is to be learned from history, and fail also to recognize the real issues in things and events around one. And the possibility to find the Christ again will elude one.

We shall continue these considerations next week.

• 1 . Friedrich Rittelmeyer, 1872–1938, professor of theology, pastor in Nurnberg and Berlin, co-founder of the Christian Community.
• 2 . Ludwig Deinhard, 1847–1917, Das Mysterium des Menschen im Lichte der psychischen Forschung, Berlin 1910.
• 3 . Arthur Drews, 1865–1935, see: “Ist Jesus eine historische Perstinlichkeit?” in Hat Jesus gelebt?, Berlin and Leipzig 1910, and Die Christusmythe, Jena 1910 and 1911.
• 4 . Meister Eckart, 1260–1327, German mystic and preacher.
• 5 . Johannes Tauler, 1300–1361, German mystic and preacher.
• 6 . Jacob Boehme, 1575–1624, German pantheist mystic and philosopher.
• 7 . Johann Gottlieb Fichte, 1762–1814, German idealist philosopher.
• 8 . Adolf Harnack, 1851–1930, German Lutheran theologian.
• 9 . Professor Dewar, 1842–1923, chemist, lecturer at the Royal Institution in London.
• 10. Rudolf Kjellen, 1864–1922, Der Staat als Lebensform, Leipzig 1916.
• 11. See also Lecture VI, p. 117 and Lecture VIII, p. 157.
• 12. Rudolf Steiner, Human and Cosmic Thought (Rudolf Steiner Press, London, 1967).
• 13. Boris Bugajeff (Andrej Bjelyi), 1880–1934. Rudolf Steiner and Goethe in der Weltanschauung der Gegenwart.
• 14. Peter III, Czar of Russia 1768–1762.
• 15. Der unsichtbare Tempel; Monatsschri ft zur Sammlung der Geister, Mtinchen 1916–1920, 5 volumes edited by the brothers Dr. Ernst and Dr. August Horneffer.
• 16. Ernst Horneffer, 1871–1954, professor in Giessen, followed Dr. Fritz Koegel as editor in the Nietzsche archives. See Nietzsches letztes Schaffen, Jena 1907.
• 17. Franz Brentano, see note 2 to Lecture I.
• 18. Franz Brentano, Das Genie, a lecture held in the Center for Engineering and Architecture in Vienna, published in Leipzig, 1892.
• 19. Franz Xavier Benedikt Baader, 1765–1841, philosopher.

In order to relate to our anthroposophical movement certain current thoughts and opinions concerned with some special phenomena, I would like today to add to our considerations some incidental material.

I will begin by speaking about experiments that are being made at the moment; they have a certain interest for us. During our discussions I have often mentioned the natural scientist Moritz Benedikt; his main interests are anthropology and criminology, though his scientific investigations cover a great variety of subjects.¹ Lately he has been intensely occupied with scientific investigations into dowsing, or water divining. The war has caused great interest in this subject. Dowsing consists mainly of the use of a fork-shaped rod, made of certain kinds of wood such as hazel. The rod is held in a special way by the prongs, and when it moves that indicates that there is either something metallic or water in the ground beneath.

Moritz Benedikt is certainly no dreamer, in fact very much the opposite; he is also someone who would emphatically reject anything to do with anthroposophy. Yet he has been completely absorbed in research into dowsing. His interest has been aroused partly because of war operations taking place in certain regions. His aim to set dowsing on a rational footing has led to experiments with certain types of people whom he calls “darkness-adapted.” I will explain in a moment why he attempts' to establish that each human being is asymmetric, a twofold being in the sense that not only does the right side differ from the left, but the two sides are polar opposites. Forces in the left side relate to forces in the right as positive magnetism relates to negative, or positive electricity to negative.

Moritz Benedikt has discovered that when a person holds the divining rod by both prongs the forces in the left side of the body unite with those in the right side. Or, as he expresses it, the forces, by flowing together, form a common stream of emanation. When a person particularly strong in such forces walks over ground beneath which there is water, a change takes place in the forces of both sides of his body. This change is caused by emanations streaming upwards from the water below into the person. It is interesting that Moritz Benedikt, himself a doctor, discovers that particularly susceptible persons can become so strongly influenced that they become ill by simply walking over ground under which there is water or a metal ore. Thus Benedikt found that if certain individuals walked over ground containing particular substances which they either ignored or knew nothing of, they could suffer illnesses such as melancholia, hypochondria or hysteria, illnesses of which doctors no longer know much more than their names. However, when the same individuals held the divining rod, they did not become ill. The rod causes the two streams of forces in the body to unite, and as it dips it diverts the force that would otherwise cause illness in some part of the body. So it is a case of streams of forces being diverted from the body through the rod.

The divining rod is a branch which has been carved into a fork, the way branches fork on a tree, and it is held by the two prongs. But how did Professor Benedikt arrive at his conclusions? He did it with the help of certain individuals whom he calls “darkness-adapted.” He calls them this because when they observe other people in the dark, they see colors. Experiments have established that the colors thus seen on a person's left side are different from those on his right side. Benedikt had the help of two such persons in his experiments. It becomes clear that these colors seen in a dark room, so dark that there is no possibility of ordinary physical sight, are what Benedikt calls emanations. We would call them deep physical aura. In this way it was possible for Professor Benedikt, with the help of “darkness-adapted” persons to prove, not only that human beings are asymmetric; i.e., show different colors on the two sides of their body, but also that the whole color picture changes when the divining rod is held. The experiment can be carried out in a laboratory; all that is needed is a bowl with water or a piece of metal. Thus in a room that is made dark one can prove what causes the effect produced by the rod.

It is interesting to look at some of the passages in Professor Benedikt's latest publication. He says:

There exist, if only in a relatively small number, human beings who are darkness-adapted! A relatively large number of this minority see many objects in darkness as luminous, but without color. A few see objects not only as luminous but colored. Already Reichenbach declared that every human being drags about a huge covering of luminous substance (emanation). Such phenomena, both colored and colorless, have since been strictly tested by me. A great many doctors and other educated people have been observed in my darkroom by two persons who are typically “darkness-adapted,” engineer Josef Pora and civil servant Hedwig Kaindl. According to the result of these tests, there can be no justified reason to doubt the correctness of what is seen and described. The gentlemen who were tested could convince themselves that the two “darkness-adapted” persons saw these unexpected phenomena on the parts of the body whose specific color emanation they described. ... The people who are “darkness-adapted” and see colors will observe on a person's right side blue at the crown of the head down over the forehead and the rest of that half of the body; on the left side red is seen, or by some, for example by engineer Pora, an orange yellow. From the back the same division and the same colors are seen ... I will mention here that an enclosed electrical battery in the darkroom glowed red at the anode and blue at the cathode terminals, thus in colors analogous to those seen on the left and right side of the body. The emanations from the two polar halves of the body were united into a single stream through the rod and combined with the emanation from the substance below the rod; its deflection signified this union.²

All this is very interesting. I must emphasize, so that there can be no misunderstanding, that what we are here concerned with has nothing to do with what I describe in my book Theosophy as the aura.³ What I describe reveals man's higher soul and spirit. What Professor Benedikt discovers in his darkroom is something that exists below the threshold, that is, not above but below the threshold of man's ordinary consciousness. These emanations or radiations are not perceptible to ordinary physical sight. What is interesting for us is the fact that a modern natural scientist finds it acceptable not only to speak about but to investigate scientifically a subconscious aura. It is also interesting that Benedikt himself finds it necessary to indicate that an aptitude for using the divining rod is not an indication of a higher kind of human capability. On the contrary it is seen to be a talent connected with man's lower organization and denied to those who are intellectually developed. It is shown that the ability of certain people to make the rod dip especially strongly is connected with lower soul impulses of a kind not perceptible to the ordinary senses, at least not in the normal way. That is why Professor Benedikt always needs “darkness-adapted” persons for his experiments.

Naturally this phenomenon comes up against opposition, but this is only to be expected; such things always create opposition. Professor Benedikt himself says on page twelve of his booklet:

The simple man instinctively recognizes dowsing as a fact; the academically educated person recognizes the generally held opinion. Thus for the former it is simply traditional knowledge and becomes irrefutable fact the moment he sees and feels the rod dip. The “intellectual” puts blinkers on and refuses to see what does not happen to fit into any compartment of his knowledge.

However, it all depends on what level someone wears his blinkers. Professor Benedikt takes his off when he investigates the aura connected with dowsing, but he puts them on when it comes to those higher realms investigated by anthroposophy. But other things of interest, based on his experiments, are published by Professor Benedikt. He says, for example:

We want to emphasize the significance these experiments have for the theory of color. The Newtonian theory that color effects originate exclusively from light which is reflected or transmitted through the prism is universally accepted without reservation by the guild of physicists, but it was challenged by Goethe. He maintained that the color impressions we receive from naturally colored objects and also from fabrics treated with natural color are due partly to the colored objects themselves. The proofs he offered were not sufficiently convincing to be generally accepted. ... With the help of the pendulum the theory of emanation dramatically confirms and clarifies one of Goethe's views; in this connection it must be stressed that reflected light produces emanations similarly colored.

Thus you see that Benedikt, now that he has embarked on research into this border realm,, comes as far as Goethe's theory of color. When one has been occupied, as I have, for more than three decades with justifying and defending Goethe's theory of color, then one is able to evaluate the extent to which there is a connection between the theory of emanation and Goethe's theory of color, and also whether there is a connection between the boneheaded materialistic theories that dominate modern physics and the rejection of Goethe's theory of color. However, what is interesting is that when someone ventures even slightly into the theory of color, he gets a little further in the direction of the anthroposophical view.

It is significant that when experiments are made with things like dowsing it is found that the simple man instinctively recognizes the phenomenon for a fact, whereas the scholar or academically trained person recognizes only the general opinion. It is significant because no age has been so dominated by opinions as ours, although it is always stressed that common sense should prevail. This is stressed especially in politics. But the fact is that healthy human common sense must today be striven for; it is simply not there. That is the great secret of our time. It must be striven for so that man can regain the connection with the spiritual world which in ancient times he had through atavistic clairvoyance. What he lost can be attained only along the path anthroposophy indicates.

I have mentioned that Professor Benedikt is a somewhat vain person which makes his books rather disagreeable to read, though it does not apply in this particular case. The frontispiece in his book is a photograph of himself, sitting in his darkroom making experiments with the pendulum. In his attempt to discover the interplay of forces between man and world, he arrives at physical auras. That is significant because even such physical experiments in this realm show that the accepted concept of space must be altered, must acquire a new foundation. Through such experiments it is shown, for example, that water is not just contained within the earth. Different emanations flow together when the water diviner walks over ground below which there is water; the rod dips because emanations rise from below and unite with emanations from the human being. In other words, water is not only under the ground; an element rises upwards from it. You may remember my pointing out the great significance of Schelling's famous—or perhaps not famous—saying: “An object exists not only where it is present; rather, it exists wherever its effect is manifest.”⁴ To comprehend such things is important. In my book Riddles of Philosophy you will find more about the significance of such concepts.⁵ They enable one to see things as they truly are, rather than to cling to preconceived notions and opinions.

Though it is naturally not generally acknowledged, individual instances do factually prove that the anthroposophical way of looking at things can guide modern man's thinking in the right direction. When an issue is approached without prejudice, thinking is led towards anthroposophy. The war has drawn attention to dowsing; it has become important to discover just what there is beneath the ground in certain regions especially in regard to water. To find water becomes essential for those who must stay behind in those regions when other sources have become exhausted. Thus investigation into dowsing reveals—especially when account is taken of the lower aspect of man's nature—that he encompasses infinitely more than either modern philosophy or biology have ever dreamed of.

It is a strange fact that although individual instances demonstrate that anthroposophy points in the right direction, it continues to be treated in the peculiar ways I have indicated in recent lectures. Those who have been connected with our movement for a longer period will understand why I am obliged today to speak about a literary phenomenon which can be said to be typical of the ways in which the spiritual stream that is anthroposophy is currently treated.

A book has just been published by a professor at Berlin University, Max Dessoir, a hefty book entitled Behind the Soul.⁶ It contains a chapter which, in the typical way I have mentioned, deals extensively with anthroposophy. When I picked up the book, my first thought was that it was going to be very interesting to see how those concerned with modern philosophy would discuss anthroposophy, and especially so as the author is a professor at a university; in fact, I looked forward to reading the book. I expected opposition of course, that cannot be otherwise for reasons I have mentioned. It is not surprising that modern philosophy is still opposed to anthroposophy; that does no harm provided the opposition is not defamatory or malicious. After all it is precisely through dialogue, through exchange of thoughts that something very positive can come about. However, as I studied this seemingly substantial book, I had to say that it was not in the least interesting. Everything he deals with, not only in the lengthy chapter on anthroposophy but elsewhere, shows that the author has not the slightest understanding of what anthroposophy is or the direction in which it points. It is quite extraordinary; he attempts to tell the reader about anthroposophy and does not come up with a single correct statement. His misinterpretations are typical of those usually made.

One's first reaction is to wonder how someone who must claim a degree of intelligence comes to present such a caricature. He must after all have investigated the subject since no decent person, you will agree, writes about something without first looking into it. On closer reading one comes to realize that he simply has no understanding of the subjects he writes about. Everything is unbelievably distorted—in fact, so distorted that anyone who takes such matters seriously is faced with an enigma. One cannot help asking how a person who must generally be regarded as clever (at least up to a point, or he would not be a professor at a university) comes to bungle an issue to such a degree.

However, when one has some experience of philology—and it is not in vain that I have worked with philologists for over six years at the Goethe-Schiller Archives in Weimar—then it is usually possible to put one's finger on the problem. I will start with a concrete example and clear up a particularly gross misunderstanding. Anyone who reads about post-Atlantean history in my books, for example in Occult Science, will know that I divide post-Atlantean time into seven consecutive epochs of which the fifth is the one we live in.⁷ How often have I mentioned that we live in the fifth epoch of post-Atlantean times, the first epoch being the ancient Indian, the second the ancient Persian and so on. This you all know. Max Dessoir, having discovered these time divisions, writes:

By ancient India is not meant present India, for in general all geological, astronomical and historical designations are to be understood symbolically. The Indian civilization was followed by the ancient Persian which was led by Zarathustra who lived much earlier than the historical personality of that name. Other epochs followed and we live in the sixth (p. 258).

Here you have one of those gross absurdities that occur when people report what I have said. But you will agree that the problem becomes worse when it is brought about by a professor whom one expects to be exact and correct in what he reports. What he writes here is certainly nonsense. If you turn to my Occult Science, you will realize how this inaccuracy came to be written. There it is said that the fifth cultural epoch was gradually prepared within the fourth, and that the fourth, fifth and sixth centuries of the fourth epoch were especially important in this preparation. The passage reads:

In the fourth, fifth and sixth centuries A.D. a new civilization-epoch was preparing in Europe. The actual beginning of it was in the fifteenth century, and we are still living in it now. Intended as it was by slow degrees to replace the fourth, the Graeco-Latin, this is the fifth post-Atlantean epoch. (pp. 218-219)

This passage Professor Dessoir reads with such care that by the fifth line he has forgotten what it is about—or perhaps filed it incorrectly in his card index—and as he looks again he reads the first line: “In the fourth, fifth and sixth centuries” the fifth epoch was being prepared; as he looks once more—as a professor he is very careful—his eye falls on the first line instead of the fifth, and he writes: “We live in the sixth epoch.”

Such is this man's method when he sets out to explain the anthroposophical movement. It shows an unbelievable superficiality which remains undetected because one simply takes for granted that professors are responsible people. Those who read this passage without checking will accept it without question. It is not so terribly important that he says sixth instead of fifth, but it is an instance that provides us with the solution to the problem—an exact philological solution—which shows the man's irresponsibility.

Let us look further in order to find the measure by which to evaluate this publication. Dessoir writes the following:

If contemporary man is to attain a higher consciousness, he must begin by immersing himself, with all his powers, in a mental picture. Best suited for this purpose is a symbolic picture such as a black cross (symbol of the lower desires and passions which have been destroyed) whose intersection is surrounded by seven red roses (symbol of desires and passions which have been purified) ... (p. 255)

Anyone who reads this passage in Max Dessoir must ask if this anthroposophy is quite mad. How is that to arise which is symbolized as purified desires and passions if the black cross symbolizes that desires and passions have been destroyed? If all desires and passions are destroyed then what is there left to transform? So again what he has written is nonsensical. But you see, the passage is supposed to be a quotation. So let us turn to Occult Science. There we read:

Then, having entered right into the experience of the thoughts and feelings, we can re-cast them in the following symbolic picture. Imagine you see before you a black cross. Let this black cross be for you a symbol for the baser elements that have been cast out of man's impulses and passions. (p. 231)

Professor Max Dessoir audaciously alters this passage to “... symbol of lower desires and passions which have been destroyed,” whereas it says: “baser elements that have been cast out of man's impulses and passions.” This shows how carelessly he reads and how inexactly he quotes. In dealing with super-sensible knowledge it is all-important to be as conscientious as possible especially when quoting, yet the learned professor appears to go out of his way to be as slovenly and inaccurate as possible.

Faced, as one is, with a complete caricature of anthroposophy one comes to realize that this man is incapable of giving a proper rendition of it, not for lack of intelligence but for lack of ordinary scientific conscientiousness. One comes to the conclusion that his main characteristic is superficiality. Let us look at another passage where he speaks about how clairvoyance can be attained:

The goal of all philosophy is attained by the soul through such inner work. One must be careful to distinguish body-free consciousness from dreamlike clairvoyance or hypnotic influences. When our soul forces have been strengthened the I can experience itself above consciousness. It is in fact possible already in the perception of color and sound to exclude the body's mediation. (p. 255)

Nowhere do I say that one can exclude the body's mediation when perceiving color and sound, but that does not prevent Professor Max Dessoir from writing that I do. It can hardly be expected that such a man should understand anything; even when he tries, he manages to misunderstand. For example, you will not find anywhere in my writings the expression “cell body.”^* That is a term that has no meaning in connection with what is said in Occult Science or indeed with anthroposophy in general. Nevertheless, Professor Dessoir says: “When through the submersion the spirit becomes free from the cell body it is still not free of all corporeality.” This is because: “The functions of the astral body are varied. It contains the patterns according to which the ether body gives the cell body its form.” (p. 256)

Nowhere do I speak of “cell body” but rather of physical body. By using such a term, everything I say concerning the physical body becomes meaningless. Thus you see that Dessoir has no understanding of the subject whatever. The following is a typical example:

The recuperation one experiences after sleep can be simpler and more straightforwardly explained without resorting to an astral body. Also, unlike Steiner, we do not need to “explain” the falling asleep of a limb as a separation of the ether body from the physical body. (p. 256)

He puts the word “explain” in quotation marks. But let us turn to <Occult Science where we find:

When, for example, a man subjects an arm or leg to an unusual pressure, a portion of the ether body may become separated from the physical. We say then that the limb has “gone to sleep.” The peculiar sensation it gives is in fact due to the severance of the ether body. (Here too, of course, materialistic thinking can deny the invisible within the visible, maintaining that the effect is merely due to the physical or physiological disturbances induced by the excessive pressure.) (p. 72)

You can see that it is not in the least denied that the physical pressure has an effect and causes the “falling asleep” of the limb. What is said is that the peculiar sensation that accompanies the experience is due to the separation of the ether body.

One wonders if such people are able to read at all. Are they capable of taking in a serious book on a spiritual subject in which every detail has been carefully considered? It is not without significance that people of this kind, capable of treating a serious contemporary work in this manner, fill the professorial chairs at universities. I had hoped to present to you today an example of how one might refute objections of an earnest nature, raised against anthroposophical issues. Instead I am obliged to show you that what we are up against are superficial people who falsify everything. Refuting serious objections would have given me great pleasure.

Dessoir finds, as one might expect, the passages in Occult Science dealing with the Saturn evolution particularly—how shall I put it—“lip-smacking.” It is only natural that he is especially offended by a passage which he presents as follows:

Various kinds of spirits move in Saturn's environment, those of form (Exusiai), of personality (Archai), of fire (Archangeloi) and of love (Seraphim). Through the Angeloi processes of nutrition and excretion develop on Saturn, and through the Cherubim, at a later stage, a dull dreamlike consciousness. The clairvoyant can experience these conditions even today, for they are actually always present to a super-sensible perception which is akin to smell. (p. 258)

So the clairvoyant is supposed to be able to experience by means of super-sensible perception akin to smell! In other words “clairsmellers” smell Saturn,conditions! Now that is something to smack one's lips over, and Dessoir cannot resist saying: “That the ‘odor of sanctity’ and the ‘stench of the devil’ is not brought to bear on this amazes me.” (p. 252)

One wonders if it would be at all possible to have a proper discussion with such a man should the occasion arise. But let us turn to Occult Science where this passage comes from; there it reads: “Inwardly (within Saturn) the dull human will manifests itself to the faculty of super-sensible perception by effects which could be compared to smell.” (p. 125) Thus this passage speaks of effects which can be compared with smell. Dessoir finds it necessary to alter it to: “The clairvoyant experiences these conditions even today through a super-sensible perception which is akin to smell.” (p. 258) In other words he turns a clear statement into nonsense, and then proceeds to criticize his own nonsense. Nor is it said by me that processes of nutrition and excretion begin on Saturn through the Angeloi. What I do say is that by the time the Angeloi appeared, processes of nutrition and excretion took place on Saturn. What is indicated is simultaneity; the Angeloi appear, and processes of nutrition and excretion begin. That these come about through the Angeloi is Dessoir's version.

Later he says: “The Christ or Sun-man taught seven great teachers.” I have not been able to find to what that sentence is supposed to refer. In Occult Science it is clearly stated that the Sun humanity experienced the Christ as the higher “I” (p. 191) which is obviously something quite different than saying “the Christ or Sun-man.” Dessoir presents things at times with great cunning. One gets the impression that his superficiality is deliberate, and he comes close to being slanderous. For example, he remembers that I speak about forces at work in the formation of the brain during early childhood. You will find descriptions of this in certain lectures with which Dessoir is slightly acquainted; these lectures are published under the title The Spiritual Guidance of Man.⁸ I describe that if one later remembers how all the wonderful wisdom which later arises in the brain could have been produced by one's own cleverness, then one comes to see how wisdom works from the unconscious in man during the first three years of childhood. The ingenious Max Dessoir, professor at Berlin University, quotes that as follows:

Particularly a person who has learned wisdom himself—this Rudolf Steiner confesses—will say: When I was a child I worked on myself with forces that entered me from the spiritual world, and what I am now able to give of the best within me must also stem from higher worlds. I cannot regard it as belonging to my ordinary consciousness. (p. 260)

Thus Dessoir gives the reader the impression that I maintain that everything I say is of my own making. Let us turn to The Spiritual Guidance of Man. There we read:

The idea thus gained of the guidance of humanity may be extended in many directions. Let us suppose that a man finds disciples—a few people who follow him. Such a one will soon become aware, through genuine self-knowledge, that the very fact of his finding disciples gives him the feeling that what he has to say does not originate with himself. The case is rather this—that spiritual powers in higher worlds wish to communicate with the disciples, and find in the teacher the fitting instrument for their manifestation.

The thought will suggest itself to such a man: when I was a child I worked on myself by the aid of forces proceeding from the spiritual world, and what I am now able to give, of my best, must also proceed from higher worlds; I may not look upon it as belonging to my ordinary consciousness. (p. 22)

That is the passage quoted by Dessoir. My continuation reads as follows:

Such a man may in fact say: something demonic, something like a “daimon”—using the word in the sense of a good spiritual power—is working out of a spiritual world through me on my disciples. Socrates felt something of this kind. (p. 22)

Thus the whole passage refers to Socrates. Max Dessoir, in bad taste—not to use stronger words—not only distorts completely what is said, but adds the following:

Because a certain individual possesses superior knowledge it is assumed that he is connected through tubes or wires to a spiritual world, thought of in materialistic terms. The objective spirit of which Hegel speaks is transformed into clusters of demons while a muddled religious thinking conjures up all kinds of phantoms. (p. 260)

Dessoir should read the chapter on Hegel in my Riddles of Philosophy, then he would have to recognize that what I say about daimons^** refers to Socrates, who used the term.⁹ In the Riddles of Philosophy I emphasize that it could never be used with reference to Hegel. I shall show why in this particular case Professor Dessoir is especially tactless. What he says amounts to slander even if it originates in superficiality mixed with all kinds of antagonistic feelings.

It is truly amazing that such distorted ideas can take hold of the brain of a modern professor. For example, I describe imaginative knowledge, which is experienced pictorially, as the first stage of super-sensible knowledge; just as one gains knowledge of physical things through abstract, shadow-like concepts, so one gains knowledge of facts belonging to higher worlds through imaginative knowledge. What Professor Dessoir makes of this is not very clear. When he reads that knowledge is gained by means of symbols, he thinks that the facts themselves are symbols. That is why he says earlier that: “Ancient India is not the present India, for generally all geological, astronomical and historical designations are to be understood symbolically.” (p. 258)

No one would think it possible for a sensible person to gain the impression from the description in Occult Science that ancient India is to be understood symbolically even though the concept does not coincide with that of modern India. Because he reads that imaginative knowledge, the first stage of higher knowledge, is symbolic he thinks that ancient India, the object of that knowledge, is itself only a symbol. This belief leads him to write, “Steiner has worked out a primordial past of earth evolution which for some reason he calls the Lemurian epoch and places it in a country that was situated between Australia and India. (Thus a concrete place, not a symbol).” (p. 261)

Thus you see that Dessoir presumes that the land of Lemuria is only meant allegorically and blames me as he finds it particularly offensive that I speak of it as real. So here he is not only superficial but stupid, though he regards himself especially clever when he ends by saying:

There are in these descriptions strange contradictions though also apparent logic. There is contradiction in saying that real facts and their mutual connections have evolved out of something merely visualized and symbolic. (p. 263)

So according to Dessoir, when knowledge is pictorial, it can depict only pictures, and he finds it contradictory that it depicts reality. Imagine if a painter found it contradictory that his painting depicted reality and confused the one with the other. In this case his superficiality amounts to stupidity.

This is an example of how the modern world presents anthroposophy. This fat book, written by a university professor, will naturally be widely read and discussed. People will read the chapter on anthroposophy and will of course not realize that what they are reading is a caricature. The announcement appearing in all the periodicals will most likely make them think that the matter has been justly dealt with. Such book announcements are usually composed by people close to the author. This particular one states that

... the book deals with cabbalistic methodology, manifest not just in the actual cabbala, but also in Freudian psychoanalysis, in the unproductive cleverness of certain exponents on Faust, and also in theoretical speculations concerning Shakespeare and Bacon. All these secondary sciences are analyzed, their shallowness revealed. The false doctrines of Guido von List and of Rudolf Steiner are investigated just as thoroughly and relentlessly, thus throwing light on the obscure and questionable theories of faith healers and Theosophists.

So there you have an example of modern scholarship. That is the way officialdom deals with a subject that seeks to serve truth. At times the superficiality of approach by the likes of Max Dessoir reaches hitherto unscaled heights. In his publication you will find this note: “Compare Rudolf Steiner's Occult Science, fifth edition, Leipzig 1913. I have in addition consulted a long list of his other publications.” (p. 254)

I have shown—and my philological training stood me in good stead—that Max Dessoir knows none of my writings except Occult Science, The Spiritual Guidance of Man and “The Occult Significance of Blood.” He has never read Riddles of Philosophy, to mention just one book. The long list of publications, apart from Occult Science, that he mentions consists of the two I have named. He continues: “Steiner's first production, The Philosophy of Freedom (Berlin 1894) is merely a prelude to the actual doctrine” (p. 254). First production! My first book was published in 1883, some eleven years before this so-called first production. That is the kind of thing one is up against.

I shall, of course, write a brochure about this chapter, and also about the rest of Dessoir's book. That must be done because it is a question of putting on record for once the glaring superficiality of a so-called learned publication by demonstrating it. One must formally show that the man is incapable of observing even rudimentary standards of propriety. Nor is it a simple matter of refuting sentence by sentence what is said; before that all the distortions must be demonstrated. Dessoir actually sets the pattern for his whole approach to the subject in his opening remarks. I am aware that of course no one will find anything wrong with those remarks. He says: “Dr. Rudolf Steiner is an altogether strange personality. He comes from Hungary where he was born on the 27th of February 1861, and has arrived in Weimar via Vienna.” (p. 254)

Well, the only time I have spent in Hungary was the first eighteen months of my life. I do not actually “come” from Hungary but from Lower Austria and I descend from an old German family. My father was an official on the Southern Austrian railway, operating between Wiener-Neustadt and Gross-Kanizsa which at that time was part of Cisleithania. He was employed at a station on the Hungarian line, at Kraljevec where I happened to be born and where I lived for eighteen months. In Kürschner¹⁰ it naturally reads: “born in Hungary,” and that is Dessoir's source of information. I know that people who are always ready to excuse lack of conscientiousness will say: Well, how could the man know otherwise when it is printed in Kürschner. However, a German professor of philosophy should not have such an easygoing attitude. It is true that Kürschner gives the place of birth, but it is well known that someone can be born in one place but originate from quite another. Nowadays that often happens as people are becoming more and more intermingled.

I mentioned that Max Dessoir is acquainted with the lecture “The Occult Significance of Blood.” His quotations from it are quite ingenious. If you look at that lecture, you will find that I proceed with the greatest caution when I explain how things were in earlier times. One of the things I explain is how the blood used to affect man's memory to a much greater extent. I emphasize that these things are difficult to describe; often one can make only approximate comparisons. Needless to say Max Dessoir completely ignores these introductory remarks. If you look up the passages to which he refers in “The Occult Significance of Blood,” you will see with what care and caution everything is described. But Max Dessoir deliberately quotes so as to give the maximum adverse impression. He first remarks: “The astral body is supposed to come to expression partly in the sympathetic nervous system, partly in the spinal cord and brain.” (p. 261) He then quotes this sentence: “The blood absorbs the pictures coming from the external world and made inward through the brain.” He then remarks further: “This colossal disdain for everything factual is combined with the equally unprovable and incomprehensible assertion that prehistoric man remembered, in the pictures received by his blood, not only his own but his ancestors' experiences.” (p. 261)

It is inexcusable to hoax the reader by abbreviating what has been explained with great care in such a way that it is rendered meaningless. This hoax is particularly damaging as it presents things in a defamatory way. Yet what is the good professor quoting? Simply the fact that what is inherited from his forebears through the blood man experienced under earlier and different conditions as memory. This Max Dessoir finds particularly objectionable; yet I would like to draw your attention to one of Dessoir's own assertions which is most interesting. He explains how it comes about that very ancient views still persist, views such as those held by superstitious country folk, by faith healers, or by Guido von List and anthroposophists. This he attempts to explain by saying:

Already from such examples can the conclusion be drawn that primitive thought forms continue to live in occult research. Admittedly this theory of a residue does not in itself provide a conclusive refutation of occultism. The truths grasped in the youth of a people could have become lost from our cultural field, but this is refuted by the facts drawn on for support. And a memory of primitive man's thoughts and views would explain why modern man has difficulty in freeing himself from them. After all, our blood has run through our veins for many centuries. Its pulsebeat is not always regular; it often becomes arhythmical as it once was. (p. 11)

In other words, when Dessoir finds in anthroposophy that our ancestors' blood runs in our veins and constitutes a kind of memory, then that is a matter for ridicule, but when he himself finds the idea useful, then it is acceptable! This is typical of Max Dessoir, Professor at Berlin University.

Those acquainted with my writings on Goethe will know of a strange book which I have always emphatically rejected, Sphinx locuta est by F.A. Louvier.¹¹ It is a dreadful book which sets out to explain Goethe's Faust by means of cabbalism. Dessoir speaks first about cabbalism itself; what he says about it would lead us too far as he does not understand it at all. In dealing with modern cabbalism he brings up Louvier's Sphinx locuta est which contains juicy bits for him to get his teeth into. This is what he has to say:

Spiritual forces appear in various places as allegoric figures. The earth spirit—truly the most obscure figure—is the spirit of the whole Faust plane (for earth represents “plane” or “glade”). Gretchen represents naivety, the black poodle negative proof and so on. With this in mind let us look at the scene: ‘At the Gates.’ When Faust symbolizes speculating reason, he resides in the head. Thus the brain represents the city and the dark cavern of the gate represents a mouth from which come audible utterances of the spirits escaping into the open. These are represented by various strollers, but not heard at this point; they are described in detail in the second part as the harbinger's wand. The poem as such is represented by soldiers. The castle (seat of thought) and maidens (feelings) must yield to the poem (soldiers). The trumpets (tones) in the poem are sounded to indicate both joy and destruction ... The middle class girl (Agathe) represents folksong, and the beloved, one of the soldiers, unites with the folksong (Agathe); thus words and song form a pair ... At the side of the folk-song (Agathe) appears a ‘Student’ representing the ballad called curly head, and with them a second student representing the refrain ... Apart from the figures already mentioned there also appear the following audible utterings coming from the gate (mouth): request, command, distortion, chatter, consent, quarrel, question, politics, promise and apology. (p. 222)

Thus Louvier, who sees the whole Kantian philosophy represented in Goethe's Faust, provides Dessoir with plenty to make fun of. Dessoir goes on to ridicule Edwin Bormann and his Shakespeare-Bacon theory,¹² demonstrating what nonsense they have produced by means of cabbalism. He then cites, in very bad taste, three poems by Stefan George.¹³¹⁴ After that he brings up race-mysticism as expounded by Guido von List.¹⁵ I knew Guido von List when he was still a reasonable person and had written his novel Carnuntum. But our only connection was when he sent me an essay in the early 1880s when I was still publishing Lucifer Gnosis.¹⁶ I returned the essay, as it was amateurish and quite unsuitable.

Dessoir goes on to speak about Christian Science. You know how much connection I have had with that! My relation to Christian Science can be summed up in the few words I usually said, when asked about it, after public lectures. Dessoir uses similar words as his own, but you know it is what I have always answered to questions about Christian Science, It is utterly materialistic; furthermore, this so-called Christian Science has no right to call itself Christian. Dessoir says:

For it is clear that the whole teaching is irreconcilable with the spirit of Christianity; a teacher that wants to eradicate all suffering cannot take the Gospels as precedent. Christianity proclaims with awesome solemnity the truth that sin and pain necessarily belong to human nature. These are not illusions of imperfect human reasoning, but facts. Hence the need for God's mercy and the sacrificial death of Jesus. Christian Science is not Christian. (243)

He goes on to describe the theosophical movement as neo-Buddhistic. Well, I could write a book about spiritualism and, based on Dessoir's own descriptions of how he has attended all kinds of spiritualistic meetings, devote a chapter to Max Dessoir, linking him with spiritualism. That would be as justifiable as the way he here links anthroposophy with theosophy, especially in the following tasteless passage:

The occult researcher of this “universal brotherhood” opposes violently the modern or pseudo-theosophists, by whom are meant the anthroposophists rallying round their master Rudolf Steiner. However, their opposition shall not prevent us from looking into this movement as well. (p. 240)

Another thing that must be pointed out is Dessoir's unscrupulous mixing things together so that they become related to issues with which they have nothing to do, as is done throughout a book. For example, you find the following:

There is always a danger that such societies could wield a certain influence especially in our uncertain times. One consolation is that race-mystics, faith healers and theosophists mutually despise and fight one another. (p. 240)

I ask you, my dear friends, have I ever fought anyone unless I was first attacked? What is said here is an example of the untruthfulness that permeates the book. You can test for yourself whether any of those mentioned have been attacked by me. Race-mysticism I have never opposed because I consider it too silly to be worth the effort. I have never said anything about faith healing except what is conveyed by the two passages just mentioned.

Dessoir is certainly a special case. I cannot today go into all the things he maintains to have experienced in various spiritualist sessions. These experiences have enabled Dessoir to write a book which is simply an elaboration of all kinds of sensations. The question is how a person comes to write a book that is really quite mad. Going through the remaining chapters one comes to the sad conclusion that the man, who is supposed to be a specialist writing about his special subject, knows nothing about it. How can a professor of philosophy such as Max Dessoir come to write a passage like the following:

A musically cultivated person will succeed at every moment, during an opera, to grasp as a unity: the text, the music—which itself is highly complex—and the acting, despite the fact that these three components may be quite independent of one another (p. 35).

Someone with any knowledge of what Aristotle, for example, says about the collaboration between the senses in the normal human being could not deliver such verbiage. So it amounts to this, that a university professor, supposedly a specialist in his field, has not read let alone studied even the simpler aspects of his subject. It is truly astounding.

Here among ourselves we can for once discuss these things freely. I shall of course be completely objective in my official refutation. I shall point objectively to the facts and refrain from using the sharp words I have employed today. It must be put to the test whether there are still people who at least become indignant when their attention is forcibly drawn to such a “cultural” publication.

Dessoir brings up another peculiar matter. He speaks about consciousness; there exists, he says, a “borderline,” even a “surface area” of consciousness. To illustrate it he comes up with the following:

Let us resort again to an easily understandable picture: from the centre of the circle [he means the circle of consciousness] “... a complex of ideas slide to the periphery and become engulfed, yet remain partially definite and coherent. To give an example: when I lecture on familiar subjects there can come into that region incidental thoughts and ideas, so that one's attention is drawn to other things. Nevertheless I continue speaking without conscious participation, as it were, in what I am saying. It has happened that I have become surprised by a sudden quiet in the hall, and have to make clear to myself that it is because I have stopped speaking! Thus habitual opinions and trains of thought can be continued “unconsciously” especially when they, as it were, move along not very vividly, while the speech connected with them, likewise continues without difficulty along well practiced paths (p. 34).

Well, I might have known! I am quite sure that not even in this circle have I ever continued speaking without being conscious of doing so, and participating in what I was saying. Dessoir's statement really amounts to an extraordinary self-revelation. One wonders to whom else this condition applies, but that I shall not pursue. He obviously considers it applies to everybody. As he at times gives lectures without participating in what he is saying, one can perhaps assume that he also continues to write page after page without participating in what he is writing—that would indeed explain a few things. But in fact the whole book appears to have been written in a state of semi-consciousness. Perhaps the professor wrote it in a kind of trance and that is the explanation for the insidious superficiality.

When one is committed to establishing a spiritual movement in the modern world, one certainly meets with things that are neither easy to bear nor to deal with. I found it necessary today to draw your attention to two of the ways in which anthroposophy is received. On the one hand I wanted to give a brief description of how someone who takes only a few steps in the right direction moves toward anthroposophy. On the other hand I wanted to show-how anthroposophy is dealt with by those who are officially appointed to represent scientific and philosophical viewpoints and are consequently taken seriously. Well, anthroposophy will struggle through on its own. But let us be clear that in a man like Max Dessoir we are dealing with someone who, apart from being utterly superficial, is also rather ridiculous.

After this digression I hope next time we can proceed and enter more deeply into our present considerations.

• 1 . Moritz Benedikt, 1835-1920, criminologist and anthropologist.
• 2 . Moritz Benedikt, Ruten- und Pendellehre, Vienna and Leipzig, 1917.
• 3 . Rudolf Steiner, Theosophy: An Introduction to the Supersensible Knowledge of the World and the Destination of Man (Anthroposophic Press, Spring Valley, NY, 1985).
• 4 . Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von Schelling, 1775–1854, see Von der Weltseele, 1798: “It is very true that a body only acts where it is; but it is equally true that it only is where it acts.”
• 5 . Rudolf Steiner, Riddles of Philosophy (Anthroposophic Press, Spring Valley, NY, 1973).
• 6 . Max Dessoir, 1867–1947, philosopher and psychologist. Vom Jenseits der Seele, Stuttgart, 1917. Further references to this book will be indicated in the text.
• 7 . Rudolf Steiner, Occult Science: An Outline (Rudolf Steiner Press, London, 1984). Further references to this book will be indicated in the text.
• *. Zellenkörper: The usual translation is “protoplasm.” Protoplasm is often defined in biology as the living substance of a cell, or the cell material when considered apart from the cell membrane. “Cell body” is here used to clarify the confusion of terms in German.
• 8 . Rudolf Steiner, The Spiritual Guidance of Man (Anthroposophic Press, Spring Valley, NY, 1976), p. 22.
• **. Daimon (Greek) = “Deity”
• 9 . Steiner, Riddles of Philosophy, ibid.
• 10. Kürschner is the name of the German publishing house that has been publishing an annually updated encyclopedia of literature, philosophy, and literary history with writers' names, dates of birth, etc. since 1873. This encyclopedia is generally known by the name of its publisher as “Kürschner.”
• 11. Ferdinand August Louvier, Sphinx Locuta est. Goethe's “Faust” und die Resultate einer rationellen Methode der Forschung. 2 volumes, Berlin, 1884, p. 122.
• 12. Edwin Bormann, 1851–1912, Der historische Beweis der Bacon-Shakespeare Theorie, 1897.
• 13. Stefan George, 1868–1933, German poet.
• 14. Steiner quotes Dessoir's comparison of these poems in order to criticize Dessoir's-method. The complete text, deleted in the text, is included here:
  
  Then he goes on to Stefan George. Here he has the tasteful style of characterizing Stefan George by quoting three of his poems. It is not necessary to go into all of that. It would take an hour to demonstrate Max Dessoir's distortions to you completely; but we will go into one of them, where he compares three poems. It is not necessary to be a fan of these poems, but I want to show you the system Max Dessoir uses. So, please, don't take it as if I were a proponent of Werfel's poems—that is not the point here.
  
  Entrückter, leichter Himmel fiber dem Ort!
  Du weißt von der Seebader goldenen Fetzen.
  Du weißt von Prinzen
  Und herbstlichem Halali.
  Ihr Knabenbaume
  Zuckt von den Schultern
  Das letzte Netz,
  Das braune.
  Den Schatten werfet auf mich,
  Hier sitze ich
  Und lese den iibermiitigen
  Namen im Stein.
  Nun bist du bei meiner Großmutter, Kind,
  O unterirdisches Fest,
  Das niemand denken will!
  
  As I said, one could hold something against this poem; but Dessoir has the tasteful touch, and compares it with the following poem. This, which I will now read, is the first of the poems:
  
  Der blasse Adelknabe spricht:
  Du Dunkelheit, aus der ich stamme?
  Ich glaube an alles noch nie Gesagte,
  Ich bin auf der Welt zu allein and doch nicht allein genug.
  Du siehst, ich will viel!
  Wir bauen an dir mit zitternden Handen.
  
  That is the first poem; then comes Werfel's poem, then comes the third. That I will also read now:
  
  Vielleicht, da ich durch schwere Berge gehe—
  Du Berg, der blieb, da die Gebirge kamen,
  Mach mich zum Wachter deiner Weiten,
  Denn, Herr, die großen Stadte sind:
  Da leben Menschen, weiß erbliihte, blasse,
  O Herr, gib jedem semen eignen Tod!
  Herr, wir sind armer denn die armen Tiere,
  Mach' Einen Herrlich, Herr, mach' Einen groß
  Das letzte Zeichen laß an uns geschehen
  
  The middle poem, that I read to you first, is really Werfel's; but to interpret it Dessoir tastefully takes a volume of Rilke's poems, and does not quote them as written but includes only their first lines as they stand in the table of contents! He makes poems by putting their first lines together, and compares them with Werfel's poem. That is the tasteful way in which he tries to characterize modern verse. He wants to say: Werfel's poem also arises, if one takes the first lines of Rilke's Stundenbuch (Prayer-Book) and writes them consecutively to construct a poem. That is how he does it.
  
  Franz Werfel, 1890–1945, Austrian poet.
  
  Rainer Maria Rilke, 1875–1926, German poet.
• 15. Guido von List, 1848–1919, Carnuntum, historischer Roman aus dem vierten Jahrhundert nach Christus, 2 volumes, Berlin, 1889.
• 16. Luzifer-Gnosis: a periodical edited by Rudolf Steiner from 1903–1908. Essays which he wrote for the journal may be found in Luzifer-Gnosis, GA 34, Dornach, and in Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and its Attainment (Anthroposophic Press, Spring Valley, NY, 1985).