LECTURE 4
The Mission of Reverence
Berlin, 28th October 1909
You
all know the words with which Goethe concluded his life's
masterpiece, Faust:
All things transient
Are but a parable;
Earth's insufficiency
Here finds fulfilment;
The indescribable
Here becomes deed;
The eternal-feminine
Draws us on high.
It goes without
saying that in this context the “eternal-feminine” has
nothing to do with man and woman. Goethe is making use of an ancient turn of
speech. In all forms of mysticism — and Goethe gives these closing
lines to a
Chorus mysticus
— we find an urge in the soul, at first quite indefinite, towards
something which the soul has not yet come to know and to unite itself with,
but must strive towards. This goal, at first only dimly surmised by the
aspiring soul, is called by Goethe, in accord with the mystics of diverse
times, the eternal-feminine, and the whole sense of the second part of
Faust
confirms this way of taking the concluding lines.
This
Chorus mysticus,
with its succinct words, can be set
against the
Unio mystical
the name given by true mystical thinkers to union with the eternal-feminine,
far off spiritually but within human reach.
When the soul
has risen to this height and feels itself to be at one with the
eternal-feminine, then we can speak of mystical union, and this is the
highest summit that we shall be considering today.
In the last two
lectures, on the mission of anger and the mission of truth, we saw that the
soul is involved in a process of evolution. On the one hand, we indicated
certain attributes which the soul must strive to overcome, whereby anger, for
example, can become an educator of the soul; and we saw on the other, how
truth can educate the soul in its own special way.
The end and goal
of this process of development cannot always be foreseen by the soul. We can
place some object before us and say that it has developed from an earlier
form to its present stage. We cannot say this of the human soul, for the soul
is progressing through a continuing evolution in which it is itself the
active agent. The soul must feel that, having developed to a certain point,
it has to go further. And as a self-conscious soul it must say to itself: How
is it that I am able to think not only about my development in the past but
also about my development in the future?
Now we have
often explained how the soul, with all its inner life, is composed of three
members. We cannot go over this in detail again today, but it will be better
to mention, it, so that this lecture can be studied on its own account. We
call these three members of the soul the Sentient Soul, the Intellectual Soul
and the Consciousness Soul. The Sentient Soul can live without being much
permeated by thinking. Its primary role is to receive impressions from the
outer world and to pass them on inwardly. It is also the vehicle of such
feelings of pleasure and pain, joy and grief, as come from these outer
impressions. All human emotions, all desires, instincts and passions arise
from within the Sentient Soul. Man has progressed from this stage to higher
levels; he has permeated the Sentient Soul with his thinking and with
feelings induced by thinking. In the Intellectual Soul, accordingly, we do
not find indefinite feelings arising from the depths, but feelings gradually
penetrated by the inner-light of thought. At the same time it is from the
Intellectual Soul that we find emerging by degrees the human Ego, that
central point of the soul which can lead to the real Self and makes it
possible for us to purify, cleanse and refine the qualities of our soul from
within, so that we can become the master, leader and guide of our volitions,
feelings and thoughts.
This Ego, as we
have seen already, has two aspects. One possibility of development for it is
through the endeavours that man must make to strengthen this inner centre
more and more, so that an increasingly powerful influence can radiate out
from it into his environment and into all the life around him. To enhance the
value of the soul for the surrounding world and at the same time to
strengthen its independence — that is one aspect of Ego
development.
The reverse side
of this is egoism. A self that is too weak will lose itself in the flood of
the world. But if a man likes to keep his pleasures and desires, his thinking
and his brooding, all within himself, his Ego will be hardened and given over
to self-seeking and egoism.
Now we have
briefly described the content of the Intellectual Soul. We have seen how wild
impulses, of which anger is an example, can educate the soul if they are
overcome and conquered. We have seen also that the Intellectual Soul is
positively educated by truth, when truth is understood as something that a
man possesses inwardly and takes account of at all times; when it leads us
out of ourselves and enlarges the Ego, while at the same time it strengthens
the Ego and makes it more selfless.
Thus we have
become acquainted with the means of self-education that are provided for the
Sentient Soul and the Intellectual Soul. Now we have to ask: Is there a
similar means provided for the Consciousness Soul, the highest member of the
human soul? We can also ask: What is there in the Consciousness Soul which
develops of its own accord, corresponding to the instincts and desires in the
Sentient Soul? Is there something that belongs by nature to the Consciousness
Soul, such that man could acquire very little of it if he were not already
endowed with it?
There is
something which reaches out from the Intellectual Soul to the Consciousness
Soul — the strength and sagacity of thinking. The Consciousness Soul
can come to expression only because man is a thinking being, for its task is
to acquire knowledge of the world and of itself, and for this it requires the
highest instrument of knowledgethinking.
We learn about the external
world through perceptions; they stimulate us to gain knowledge of our
surroundings. To this end, we need only devote our attention to the outer
world and not stand blankly in front of it, for then the outer world itself
draws us on to satisfy our thirst for knowledge by observing it. With regard
to gaining knowledge of the super-sensible world, we are in a quite different
situation. First of all, the super-sensible world is not there in front of us.
If a man wishes to gain a knowledge of it, so that this knowledge will
permeate his Consciousness Soul, the impulse to do so must come from within
and must penetrate his thinking through and through. This impulse can come
only from the other powers of his soul, feeling and willing. Unless his
thinking is stimulated by both these powers, it will never be impelled to
approach the super-sensible world. This does not mean that the super-sensible
is merely a feeling, but that feeling and willing must act as inner guides
towards its unknown realm. What qualities, then, must feeling and willing
acquire towards its unknown realm.
What qualities,
then, must feeling and willing acquire in order to do this?
First of all,
someone might object to the use of a feeling as a guide to knowledge. But a
simple consideration will show that in fact this is what feeling does. Anyone
who takes knowledge seriously, will admit that in acquiring knowledge we must
proceed logically. We use logic as an instrument for testing the knowledge we
acquire. How, then, if logic is this instrument, can logic itself be proved?
One might say: Logic can prove itself. Yes, but before we begin proving logic
by logic, it must be at least possible to grasp logic with our feeling.
Logical thought cannot be proved primarily by logical thought, but only by
feeling. Indeed, everything that constitutes logic is first proved through
feeling, by the infallible feeling for truth that dwells in the human soul.
From this classical example we can see how feeling is the foundation of logic
and of thinking. Feeling must give the impulse for the verification of
thought. What must feeling become if it is to provide an impulse not only for
thinking in general, but for thinking about worlds with which we are at first
unacquainted and cannot survey?
Feeling of this
kind must be a force which strives from within towards an object yet unknown.
When the human soul seeks to encompass with feeling some other thing, we call
this feeling love. Love can of course be felt for something known, and there
are many things in the world for us to love. But as love is a feeling, and a
feeling is the foundation of thinking in the widest sense, we must be clear
that the unknown super-sensible can be grasped by feeling before thinking
comes in. Unprejudiced observation, accordingly, shows that it must be
possible for human beings to come to love the unknown super-sensible before
they are able to conceive it in terms of thought. This love is indeed
indispensable before the super-sensible can be penetrated by the light of
thought.
At this stage,
also, the will can be permeated by a force which goes out towards the
super-sensible unknown. This quality of the will, which enables a man to wish
to carry out his aims and intentions with regard to the unknown, is devotion.
So can the will inspire devotion towards the unknown, while feeling becomes
love of the unknown; and when these two emotions are united they together
give rise to reverence in the true sense of the word. Then this devotion
becomes the impulse that will lead us into the unknown, so that the unknown
can be taken hold of by our thinking. Thus it is that reverence becomes the
educator of the Consciousness Soul. For in ordinary life, also, we can say
that when a man endeavours to grasp with his thinking some external reality
not yet known to him, he will be approaching it with love and devotion. Never
will the Consciousness Soul gain a knowledge of external objects unless love
and devotion inspire its quest; otherwise the objects will not be truly
observed. This also applies quite specially to all endeavours to gain
knowledge of the super-sensible world.
In all cases,
however, the soul must allow itself to be educated by the Ego, the source of
self-consciousness. We have seen how the Ego gains increasing independence
and strength by overcoming certain soul qualities, such as anger, and by
cultivating others, such as the sense of truth. After that, the
self-education of the Ego comes to an end; its education through reverence
begins. Anger is to be overcome and discarded; a sense of truth is to
permeate the Ego; reverence is to flow from the Ego towards the object of
which knowledge is sought. Thus, having raised itself out of the Sentient
Soul and the Intellectual Soul by overcoming anger and other passions and by
cultivating a sense of truth, the Ego is drawn gradually into the
Consciousness Soul by the influence of reverence. If this reverence becomes
stronger and stronger, one can speak of it as a powerful impulse towards the
realm described by Goethe:
All things transient
Are but a parable;
Earth's insufficiency
Here finds fulfilment;
The indescribable
Here becomes deed;
The eternal-feminine
Draws us on high.
The soul is
drawn by the strength of its reverence towards the eternal, with which it
longs to unite itself. But the Ego has two sides. It is impelled by necessity
to enhance continually its own strength and activity. At the same time it has
the task of not allowing itself to fall under the hardening influence of
egoism. If the Ego seeks to go further and gain knowledge of the unknown and
the super-sensible, and takes reverence as its guide, it is exposed to the
immediate danger of losing itself. This is most likely to happen, above all,
to a human being if his will is always submissive to the world. If this
attitude gains increasingly the upper hand, the result may be that the Ego
goes out of itself and loses itself in the other being or thing to which it
has submitted. This condition can be likened to fainting by the soul, as
distinct from bodily fainting. In bodily fainting the Ego sinks into
undefined darkness; in fainting by the soul, the Ego loses itself spiritually
while the bodily faculties and perceptions of the outer world are not
impaired. This can happen if the Ego is not strong enough to extend itself
fully into the will and to guide it.
This
self-surrender by the Ego can be the final result of a systematic
mortification of the will. A man who pursues this course becomes incapable of
willing or acting on his own account; he has surrendered his will to the
object of his submissive devotion and has lost his own self. When this
condition prevails, it produces an enduring impotence of the soul. Only when
a devotional feeling is warmed through by the Ego, so that man can immerse
himself in it without losing his Ego, can it be salutary for the human
soul.
How, then, can
reverence always carry the Ego with it? The Ego cannot allow itself to be led
in any direction, as a human Self, unless it maintains in its thinking a
knowledge of itself. Nothing else can protect the Ego from losing itself when
devotion leads it out into the world. The soul can be led out of itself
towards something external by the force of will, but when the soul leaves
behind the boundary of the external, it must make sure of being illuminated
by the light of thought.
Thinking itself
cannot lead the soul out; this comes about through devotion, but thinking
must then immediately exert itself to permeate with the life of thought the
object of the soul's devotion. In other words, there must be a resolve to
think about this object. Directly the devotional impulse loses the will to
think, there is a danger of losing oneself. If anyone makes it a matter of
principle not to think about the object of his devotion, this can lead in
extreme cases to a lasting debility of the soul.
Is love, the
other element in reverence, exposed to a similar fate? Something that
radiates from the human Self towards the unknown must be poured into love, so
that never for a moment does the Ego fail to sustain itself. The Ego must
have the will to enter into everything which forms the object of its
devotion, and it must maintain itself in face of the external, the unknown,
the super-sensible. What becomes of love if the Ego fails to maintain itself
at the moment of encountering the unknown, if it is unwilling to bring the
light of thinking and of rational judgment to bear on the unknown? Love of
that kind becomes more sentimental enthusiasm
(Schwarmerei).
But the Ego can begin to find
its way from the Intellectual Soul, where it lives, to the external unknown,
and then it can never extinguish itself altogether. Unlike the will, the Ego
cannot completely mortify itself. When the soul seeks to embrace the external
world with feeling, the Ego is always present in the feeling, but if it is
not supported by thinking and willing, it rushes forth without restraint,
unconscious of itself. And if this love for the unknown is not accompanied by
resolute thinking, the soul can fall into a sentimental extreme, somewhat
like sleep-walking, just as the state reached by the soul when submissive
devotion leads to loss of the Self is somewhat like a bodily fainting-fit.
When a sentimental enthusiast goes forth to encounter the unknown, he leaves
behind the strength of the Ego and takes with him only secondary forces.
Since the strength of the Ego is absent from his consciousness, he tries to
grasp the unknown as one does in the realm of dreams. Under these conditions
the soul falls into what may be called an enduring state of dreaming or
somnambulism.
Again, if the
soul is unable to relate itself properly to the world and to other people, if
it rushes out into life and shrinks from using the light of thought to
illuminate its situation, then the Ego, having fallen into a somnambulistic
condition, is bound to go astray and to wander through the world like a
will-o-the-wisp.
If the soul
succumbs to mental laziness and shuns the light of thought when it meets the
unknown, then, and only then, will it harbour superstitions in one or other
form. The sentimental soul, with its fond dreams, wandering through life as
though asleep, and the indolent soul, unwilling to be fully conscious of
itself — these are the souls most inclined to believe everything
blindly. Their tendency is to avoid the effort of thinking for themselves and
to allow truth and knowledge to be prescribed for them.
If we are to get
to know an external object, we have to bring our own productive thinking to
bear on it, and it is the same with the super-sensible, whatever form this may
take. Never, in seeking to gain a knowledge of the super-sensible, must we
exclude thinking. Directly we rely on merely observing the super-sensible, we
are exposed to all possible deceptions and errors. All such errors and
superstitions, all the wrong or untruthful ways of entering the super-sensible
worlds, can be attributed in the last instance to a refusal to allow
consciousness to be illuminated by the light of creative thought. No one can
be deceived by information said to come from the spiritual world if he has
the will to keep his thinking always active and independent. Nothing else
will suffice, and this is something that every spiritual researcher will
confirm. The stronger the will is to creative thinking, the greater is the
possibility of gaining true, clear and certain knowledge of the spiritual
world.
Thus we see the
need for a means of education which will lead the Ego into the Consciousness
Soul and will guide the Consciousness Soul in the face of the unknown, both
the physical unknown and the unknown super-sensible. Reverence, consisting of
devotion and love, provides the means we seek. When the latter are imbued
with the right kind of self-feeling, they become steps which lead to
ever-greater heights.
True devotion,
in whatever form it is experienced by the soul, whether through prayer or
otherwise, can never lead anyone astray. The best way of learning to know
something is to approach it first of all with love and devotion. A healthy
education will consider especially how strength can be given to the
development of the soul through the devotional impulse. To a child the world
is largely unknown: if we are to guide him towards knowledge and sound
judgment of it, the best way is to awaken in him a feeling of reverence
towards it; and we can be sure that by so doing we shall lead him to fullness
of experience in any walk of life.
It is very
important for the human soul if it can look back to a childhood in which
devotion, leading on to reverence, was often felt. Frequent opportunities to
look up to revered persons, and to gaze with heartfelt devotion at things
that are still beyond its understanding, provide a good impulse for higher
development in later life. A person will always gratefully remember those
occasions, when as a child in the family circle, he heard of some outstanding
personality of whom everyone spoke with devotion and reverence. A feeling of
holy awe, which gives reverence a specially intimate character, will then
permeate the soul. Or someone may relate how with trembling hand, later on,
he rang the bell and shyly made his way into the room of the revered
personality whom he was meeting for the first time, after having heard him
spoken of with so much respectful admiration. Simply to have come into his
presence and exchanged a few words can confirm a devotion which will be
particularly helpful when we are trying to unravel the great riddles of
existence and are seeking for the goal which we long to make our own. Here
reverence is a force which draws us upward, and by so doing fortifies and
invigorates the soul. How can this be? Let us consider the outward expression
of reverence in human gestures — what forms does it take? We bend our
knees, fold our hands, and incline our heads towards the object of our
reverence. These are the organs whereby the Ego, and above all the higher
faculties of the soul, can express themselves most intensively.
In physical life
a man stands upright by firmly extending his legs; his Ego radiates out
through his hands in acts of blessing; and by moving his head he can observe
the earth or the heavens. But from studying human nature, we learn also that
our legs are stretched out at their best in strong, conscious action if they
have first learnt to bend the knee where reverence is really strong,
conscious action if they have first learnt to bend the knee where reverence
is really due. For this genuflection opens the door to a force which seeks to
find its way into our organism. Knees which have not learnt to bend in
reverence give out only what they have always had; they spread out their own
nullity, to which they have added nothing. But legs which have learnt to
genuflect receive, when they are extended, a new force, and then it is this,
not their own nullity, which they spread around them. Hands which would fain
bless and comfort, although they have never been folded in reverence and
devotion, cannot bestow much love and blessing from their own nullity. But
hands which have learnt to fold themselves in reverence have received a new
force and are powerfully penetrated by the Ego. For the path taken by this
force leads first through the heart, where it kindles love; and the reverence
of the folded hands, having passed through the heart and flowed into the
hands, turns into blessing.
The head may
turn its eyes and strain its ears to survey the world in all directions, but
it presents nothing but its own emptiness. If, however, the head has been
bent in reverence, it gains a new force; it will bring to meet the outer
world the feelings it has acquired through reverence.
Anyone who
studies the gestures of people, and knows what they signify, will see how
reverence is expressed in external physiognomy; he will see how this
reverence enhances the strength of the Ego and so makes it possible for the
Ego to penetrate into the unknown. Moreover, this self-education through
reverence has the effect of raising to the surface our obscure instincts and
emotions, our sympathies and antipathies, which otherwise make their way into
the soul unconsciously or subconsciously, unchallenged by the light of
judgment. Precisely these feelings are cleansed and purified through
self-education by reverence and through the penetration by the Ego of the
higher members of the soul. The obscure forces of sympathy and antipathy,
always prone to error, are permeated by the light of the soul and transformed
into judgment, aesthetic taste and rightly guided moral feeling. A soul
educated by reverence will convert its dark cravings and aversions into a
feeling for the beautiful and a feeling for the good. A soul that has
cleansed its obscure instincts and will-impulses through devotion will
gradually build up from them what we call moral ideals. Reverence is
something that we plant in the soul as a seed; and the seed will bear
fruit.
Human life
offers yet another example. We see everywhere that the course of a man's life
goes through ascending and declining stages. Childhood and youth are stages
of ascent; then comes a pause, and finally, in the later years, a decline.
Now the remarkable thing is, that the qualities acquired in childhood and
youth reappear in a different form during the years of decline. If much
reverence, rightly guided, has been part of the experience of childhood, it
acts as a seed which comes to fruition in old age as strength for active
living. A childhood and youth during which devotion and love were not
fostered under the right guidance will lead to a weak and powerless old age.
Reverence must take hold of every soul that is to make progress in its
development.
How is it, then,
with the corresponding quality in the object of our reverence? If we look
with love on another being, then the reciprocated love of the latter will
reveal what can perhaps arise. If a man is lovingly devoted to his God, he
can be sure that God inclines to him also in love. Reverence is the feeling
he develops for whatever he calls his God out there in the universe. Since
the reaction to reverence cannot itself be called reverence, we may not speak
of a divine reverence towards man. What, then, precisely is the opposite of
reverence in this context? What is it that flows out to meet reverence when
reverence seeks the divine? It is might,
the Almighty power of the Divine. Reverence that we learn to
feel in youth returns to us as strength for living in old age, and if we turn
in reverence to the divine, our reverence flows back to us as an experience
of the Almighty. That is what we feel, whether we look up to the starry
heavens in their endless glory and our reverence goes out to all that lies
around us, beyond our compass, or whether we look up to our invisible God, in
whatever form, who pervades and animates the cosmos.
We look up
towards the Almighty and we come to feel with certainty that we cannot
advance towards union with that which is above us unless we first approach it
from below with reverence. We draw nearer to the Almighty when we immerse
ourselves in reverence. Thus we can speak of an Almighty in this sense, while
a true feeling for the meaning of words prevents us from speaking of an
All-loving. Power can be increased or enhanced in proportion to the number of
beings over which it extends. It is different with love. If a child is loved
by its mother, this does not prevent her from loving equally her second,
third or fourth child. It is false for anyone to say: I must divide up my
love because it is to cover two objects. It is false to speak either of an
“all-knowledge” or of an indefinite “all-love”. Love
has no degree and cannot be limited by figures.
Love and
devotion together make up reverence. We can have a devoted attitude to this
or that unknown if we have the right feeling for it. Devotion can be
enhanced, but it does not have to be divided up or multiplied when it is felt
for a number of beings. Since this is true also of love, the Ego has no need
to lose or disperse itself if it turns with love and devotion towards the
unknown. Love and devotion are thus the right guides to the unknown, and the
best educators of, the soul in its advance from the Intellectual Soul to the
Consciousness Soul.
Whereas the
overcoming of anger educates the Sentient Soul, and the striving for truth
educates the Intellectual Soul, reverence educates the Consciousness Soul,
bringing more and more knowledge within its reach. But this reverence must be
led and guided from a standpoint which never shuts out the light of thought.
When love flows forth from us, it ensures by its own worth that our Self can
go with it, and this applies also to devotion. We could indeed lose our Self,
but we need not. That is the point, and it must be kept especially in mind if
an impulse of reverence enters into the education of the young. A blind,
unconscious reverence is never right. The cultivation of reverence must go
together with the cultivation of a healthy Ego-feeling.
Whereas the
mystics of all ages, together with Goethe, have spoken of the unknown,
undefined element to which the soul is drawn, as the eternal-feminine,
we may without misunderstanding, speak of the element which must
always animate reverence as the eternal-masculine. For just as the
eternal-feminine is present in both man and woman, so is this
eternal-masculine, this healthy Ego-feeling, present in all reverence
by man or woman. And when Goethe's
Chorus mysticus
comes before us, we may, having come to
know the mission of reverence which leads us towards the unknown, add the
element which must permeate all reverence — the Eternal-masculine.
Thus we are now
able to reach a right understanding of the experience of the human soul when
it strives to unite itself with the unknown and attains to the
Unio mystica,
wherein all reverence is consummated.
But this
mystical union will harm the soul if the Ego is lost while seeking to unite
itself with the unknown in any form. If the Ego has lost itself, it will
bring to the unknown nothing of value. Self-sacrifice in the
Unio mystica
requires that one
must have become something, must have something to sacrifice. If a weak Ego,
with no strength in itself, is united with what lies above us, the union has
no value. The
Unio mystica
has value only when a strong Ego ascends to the regions of which the
Chorus mysticus
speaks. When Goethe speaks of the regions to which the higher reverence
can lead us, in order to gain there the highest knowledge, and when his
Chorus mysticus
tells us in beautiful words:
All things transient
Are but a parable;
Earth's insufficiency
Here finds fulfilment;
The indescribable
Here becomes deed;
The eternal-feminine
Draws us on high —
Then, if we
rightly understand the
Unio mystica,
we can reply: Yes —
All things transient
Are but a parable;
Earth's insufficiency
Here finds fulfilment;
The indescribable
Here becomes deed;
The eternal-masculine
Draws us on high.
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