LECTURE 6 (AND LAST).
THE INNER ASPECT OF THE
EARTH-EMBODIMENT OF THE EARTH.
5th December, 1911.
In a series of
lectures the fact has now been brought home to us that behind all
that we call Maya or the great illusion, there is the Spiritual. Let
us once again ask ourselves in what way it has been made evident that
the spiritual is to be discerned behind everything perceptible to our
senses and our physically limited view.
In order to describe
this spiritual essence we were obliged in the last lecture to sweep
the nearest external phenomena away from our field of vision and
pierce through to such qualities of the reality as those described as
the willingness to sacrifice, and the virtue of bestowal or
renunciation, in fact, to those virtues with which we can only become
acquainted by looking into our own souls, and which we can only fully
comprehend by means of our own souls. Now if we are really to
attribute such virtues as these to what we have to think of as the
reality — we might almost say the ‘true’ —
behind the world of illusion, we must admit that in this world of
true existence, in this world of reality, there lives that which
fundamentally, as regards its qualities, can only be compared with
the qualities we primarily perceive in our souls. For instance if we
have to characterise that which is outwardly expressed in the
phenomena of heat, presenting it in its true character of sacrificial
service, as the flowing sacrifice in the world, it means precisely
that we must reduce the elements of heat back to the spiritual, to
the incorporeal, doing away, as it were, with the outer veil of
existence, showing that which in the external world is similar to
what we recognise as the spiritual in ourselves.
Now before we carry
these observations further, another idea is necessary. That is the
following. Does all that we have in this world of Maya or illusion
really vanish into a sort of nothingness? Is everything around us in
this world of sense, the world of our external comprehension which to
us appears as the real or part of the real — is all this
actually nothing?
It would indeed be
quite a good comparison if we were to say that the world of truth,
the world of reality, is at first concealed, as the inner forces of a
lake or even of the ocean are concealed in the body of water, and
that the world of Maya might be compared with the rippling play of
the waves on the surface. That would be a good comparison; for it
shows exactly that there is in the depths of the ocean something that
causes the movement of the waves above, something that is the
substantiality of the water and the configuration of its force. So
that whether we select this example or any other is a matter of
indifference, we may very well put the question:--Is there in the
wide realms of our Maya or illusion, anything that is real? In this
lecture we shall follow the same system as in the last. We shall
slowly approach what we wish to bring before our mind, by starting
with the inner experience of our soul; and indeed, as we have moved
forward spiritually through the Saturn, Sun and Moon-existence, and
have now approached that of the earth, we shall start from more
intimate, we might almost say more common soul-experience than those
referred to in our last lecture. We then started from the hidden
depths of the soul-life, from what arises in the astral body. There
we felt longing arising within it, and we saw how the longing works
in the nature of man, actually leading the life of the soul to find
satisfaction only in the advance of that world of ideas which we have
been able to grasp as the inner movement of that life. We thus found
the way from the microcosmic soul to that cosmic creating which we
ascribed to the Spirits of Movement. To-day we shall begin with a
still more intimate experience of the soul, one indeed to which
attention was already drawn in ancient Greece, which in its reality
is even to-day of profound significance. It is indicated in the
words: all philosophy, and all striving for a certain kind of human
knowledge, must come from Wonder. This is really the case. Any man
who has devoted a little reflection and thought to the whole sequence
in experience in his own soul, as to how he was brought to any
particular learning, will come to know that a sound way to learning
is always to start from wonder, from astonishment at something. This
wonder, this astonishment, from which every form of learning must
proceed, belongs precisely to those experiences of the soul which we
described as bringing sublimity and life into anything, however dry.
What kind of learning would it be which found a place in our soul,
without proceeding from wonder! It would truly be a learning swamped
in prosiness and pedantry. That process in the soul which leads from
wonder to the bliss we feel when our riddles are solved, which first
arises from wonder, in that alone constitutes the sublimity and vital
power of the process of acquiring knowledge. We should be able
actually to feel the dryness and withering of any knowledge not
originating in these two movements of the mind. Sound knowledge is
framed in wonder and the bliss of solved riddles: Any other kind of
knowledge may be acquired externally and established by man through
any kind of reasoning. But a knowledge not framed by these two
feelings, does not spring from the soul of man in real earnest. All
the fragrance of knowledge created by the atmosphere of vital
power, proceeds from these two, from wonder and the bliss of is
satisfaction.
But what is the origin
of wonder itself? Why is it that wonder, astonishment at
anything external, arises in our souls? It arises, because, when we
first meet with a being, a thing or a fact, it appears strange to us.
This strangeness is the first element leading to wonder and
astonishment. But we do not feel this for everything that is strange
to us; but only for that to which we feel ourselves in a sense
related, so related that we say: ‘In this being or thing there
is something that is not as yet in me, but which may fill me.’
So that we can feel related to a thing yet strange, which at first we
must grasp through wonder and astonishment, our inner
‘wondering’ is our perception of the quality of an outer
‘wonder’ to which a man at first as far as his own
perception goes, considers himself in no wise related. That however
depends on himself, or at least it need only do so. And he should not
adopt a challenging attitude towards what appears to him as ‘a
wonder’ unless he can in a certain way make claim to explain it
because it is related to him. Why else should people who start from
purely materialistic or purely intellectual concepts deny what others
designate as a ‘wonder’, when they have no direct proof
that a fabrication, a falsehood, is brought forward? Even
philosophers to-day are obliged to admit that it can never be proved
by any of the phenomena known to man, that the Christ incarnated in
Jesus of Nazareth did not rise again. Proof can be brought against
this assertion; but what is the manner of these proofs? Logically
they are not tenable! Even enlightened philosophers now admit that.
For all the reasons brought against it from the materialistic side
— as for instance, the statement that no man has yet been seen
to have risen like Christ — all these reasons are on the same
level as the argument of a man who had never seen anything but fish
and therefore wished to prove the non-existence of birds. It is
impossible logically to prove by the existence of one class of
beings, that others do not exist. Just as little is it possible
through the experience a man may have on the physical plane to
disprove, what must at first be described as a ‘miracle’,
anything connected with the event of Golgotha. But if something is
communicated to a person, which although it may be true, he must call
a miracle and he says that he cannot understand it, he does not
thereby contradict what we have said about the idea of wondering; for
his attitude shows clearly that this fundamental basis of all
knowledge is already established in him. He demands that what he has
been told should find an echo in himself. He wishes it to become its
own property intellectually and as he believes that he cannot have
that, and it is not related to him, he challenges it. Even if we
ourselves arrive at the concept of the miraculous, we should see that
astonishment or marvel, upon which is based all the ancient Greek
philosophy, is aroused by a man finding himself confronted with
something strange to him, but to which at the same time he
recognises a relationship. Let us try to create a connecting link
between this idea and those brought before our minds in the last
lecture.
We have said that a
particular advance in evolution was brought about through the
willingness of certain Beings to sacrifice, and their sacrifices
being rejected and thrown back, and we learnt to recognise in the
rejected sacrifice one of the principle factors in the ancient
Moon-evolution. One of the most vital points in that evolution is the
fact that during that period sacrifice was to be offered by certain
Beings to Entities even more exalted, and that it was renounced by
them; so that, as it were, the smoke of the sacrifice offered by the
ancient Moon-Beings pressed through to the Higher Entities but was
not accepted by them; and that this was sent back as substance
into the Beings who had desired to offer it up. We also saw that much
of the peculiar character of the Beings belonging to ancient Moon was
caused by their feeling within them what they had wished to send up
to the Higher Entities as sacrificial substance. We saw, indeed that
this, which aspired, but was unable to ascend to the Higher Entities,
remained behind within the Beings themselves — thereby was
developed in certain Beings — in the Beings of the rejected,
the force of Longing. We have still, in all that we sacrifice in our
own souls as longing, a legacy from the bygone events on ancient Moon
when those Beings found their sacrifice rejected. In a spiritual
sense the whole character of the ancient Moon-evolution, its whole
spiritual atmosphere, may be described in many respects by saying
that Beings were present there who desired to offer sacrifice, but
found that this sacrifice was not accepted because the Higher
Entities resigned it. The peculiar feature of the spiritual
atmosphere of ancient Moon was; the rejected sacrifice. And the
rejection of the sacrifice offered by Cain, which symbolically
represents one of the starting points of the evolution of earthly
humanity, appears as a kind of recapitulation of this peculiar
feature of the ancient Moon evolution taking place in the soul of
Cain, who sees that his sacrifice is not accepted. This is something
which reveals to us a pain, which gives birth to Longing, just as was
the case with the Beings belonging to the old Moon-existence.
We saw in the last lecture, that between this rejected sacrifice and
the longing arising in these beings through its rejection, an
adjustment was produced through the appearances on the old Moon
of the Spirits of Movement. They created a possible way by which the
longing arising in the Entities of the rejected sacrifice, could in a
sense be satisfied. You must picture the position very clearly in
your minds. You have the exalted Beings to whom sacrifice is about to
be made; the substance offered in sacrifice to them rejected; and the
longing thereby arising within the Beings who desired to offer and
now feel: ‘Had I been able to accomplish my sacrifice, the best
part of my own being would be living in those exalted ones; but now
lam shut out from them, I am here while they are yonder!’ The
Spirits of Movement, however, and this can be taken almost literally,
bring the Beings in whom the rejected sacrifice is as a longing
after the Higher Beings, into such a condition that they can approach
them from many different sides. That which remains in them as the
sacrifice which could not be offered, can at any rate now be
adjusted, through the wealth of impressions received from the Higher
Beings, who are as it were, encircled by the substance of the
rejected sacrifice. So is adjusted what could not be harmonised,
because of the rejection of the sacrifice, inasmuch as a relation is
established between these beings and the Higher Entities which
conveyed the impression of a presented sacrifice. We can form a
clear idea of what this implies, if we think symbolically of the more
exalted Entities united as a Sun, and then, in one position, as a
planet, the less exalted gathered together. Now suppose that the
Beings of the lesser planet wished to make sacrifice to the greater
planet — to the Sun [Editor's Note: The Sun was once a planet]
— and that the Sun refused to accept it and threw it back; the
substance of the sacrifice must remain in the Beings whose sacrifice
was not accepted. Then in their loneliness, their isolation fills
their Being with longing. Now the Spirits of Movement bring them into
the periphery of the more exalted Entities; this makes it first
possible for them, hi place of the direct upward flow of their
sacrificial substance, to set that substance itself in motion and
thereby to bring it into connection with the Higher Entities. This is
exactly like a man who cannot be contented within himself by means of
a single great satisfaction, but experiences a number of partial
satisfactions; the result of these different experiences being to set
all his feelings in motion. This was gone into more minutely in the
last lecture. We saw that as the Beings were unable to feel an inner
connection with the Higher Beings through the sacrifice, impressions
came to them outside in the place of this, by which we saw that they
were still able to obtain a certain satisfaction.
But it is an
undeniable fact that that which was to have been offered up would
have continued its existence within the Higher Entities in a
different fashion from its state within the lower Beings. The actual
conditions necessary to that existence are in those Higher Beings. It
became necessary, therefore, for different conditions of existence to
arise in the lower Beings. This again can be symbolically expressed.
If a planet were able to pour all its contents into the Sun and these
were not rejected, the essence of that planet would find different
conditions of existence within the Sun from those it would have met
with in the planet outside if the Sun had thrown it back: an
estrangement of what we must call the contents of the sacrifice takes
place, it is alienated from its origin.
Now bear in mind the
thought that certain Beings are compelled to retain within them
something which they would gladly have offered up in sacrifice, and
concerning which they both feel and perceive that it could only
attain its real meaning, if it could be offered up.
If you can picture the
feelings of such Beings, you will have an idea of what may be called:
‘The exclusion of a certain number of Cosmic Beings from their
actual meaning, their great Cosmic purpose.’ Certain Beings
have within them something, which, speaking symbolically, could only
fulfil its purpose elsewhere. The consequence of this is that the
‘displacement’ — if we may once more speak
symbolically — of the rejected incense, of the rejected
sacrificial substance, excludes it at first from the rest of the
Cosmic process.
If you grasp these
thoughts with your feeling — not with your reason, for that
does not extend to matters such as these — you will perceive
that this represents something like a rending away from the universal
Cosmic process. To the Beings who rejected the sacrifice it is only
something they put away from them; to the other Beings, those within
whom the sacrificial substance is retained, this is a something on
which an alien character is imprinted from the outset. Thus there are
Beings in whose substance this alien stamp is imprinted from the
beginning. If we can present these things to our soul through inner
feeling, we are reminded of something in which an alien character is
inherent from the beginning: — that is Death! Death is none
other than that which necessarily enters the universe with the
rejection of the sacrificial substance of those Beings who then had
to retain it within themselves. Thus we advance from Resignation,
from Renunciation — which we encounter at the third stage of
evolution; to that which comes into existence through the
renunciation by the Higher Entities of Death.
In its true
significance death is neither more nor less than the attribute of the
inner contents of certain Beings, contents which are shut out and not
in their proper place. Even when death comes to a man in a concrete
form it is fundamentally the same thing. For when we look at a corpse
left behind in the world of Maya, we know that it consists of nothing
but matter which at the moment of death, was shut out from the Ego,
astral body, and etheric body, alienated from that within which alone
it had a meaning. The physical body without the etheric body, astral
body, and Ego has no meaning, it is purposeless; at that moment it is
excluded from its purpose. That which we can no longer perceive when
a man dies, is then for us in the macrocosm. On account of the Cosmic
Beings who belong to higher spheres having rejected what was to have
been brought to them in sacrifice, the rejected sacrificial substance
within the Beings to whom it was thrown back lapses into death, for
death signifies the exclusion of any Cosmic substance or Cosmic Being
from its actual purpose.
We have now come to a
spiritual characteristic of what we call the fourth element in the
Universe. If (1) fire represents the purest sacrifice — and
where-ever we encounter fire or heat, behind it there is its
spiritual counterpart: Sacrifice — if (2) behind all the air
spread out around our earth there really lies the virtue of giving, a
really flowing virtue; if (3) we may describe flowing water or the
element of fluidity as spiritual resignation or renunciation, so must
we describe the element of Earth, (4) which alone can be the bearer
of death — for death would not exist without it — as that
which was severed from its purpose by renunciation. Now we have
something in a concrete form, showing how the solid was formed from
the fluidic. For this too reflects a spiritual process, in a certain
sense. Suppose ice forms in a pond; the water then becomes solid. The
real reason of this is that the water in becoming ice is cut off from
its purpose. This gives us the process of solidification, the
spiritual process of the Earth's becoming; for as far as the
distinguishing marks of the four elements are concerned, ice too is
earth, and fluid alone is water. Earth is the element in which death
appears and may be experienced.
We began by putting
the question as to whether anything real could be found in our world
of illusion and Maya, whether there is anything in it corresponding
to a reality. I want you to hold clearly to the idea we have just
been considering. At the beginning of this course I told you that the
concepts to be considered were somewhat complicated. It will
therefore be necessary that we should not only try to understand
them, but also to meditate upon them; for only then will they be
clear to us. Now let us take this conception of the relation of
death to the earth; for it presents a truly remarkable aspect.
Whereas concerning all our other concepts we could say that there was
nothing real in all the world of Maya around us, but that the reality
must be looked for in the spiritual behind it — we have now
ascertained that within the world of Maya there is that, which,
precisely because it is divided from its purpose, because it ought to
be in the spiritual world may be called death. Thus something is cut
off in Maya, which actually ought not to be there. In the whole wide
realm of Maya or the great illusion, we have nothing but
deception and illusion before us. Yet there is something there
which corresponds to a reality, because it is cut off from its true
meaning in the spiritual; and as soon as it enters Maya it encounters
annihilation and death. That declares to us nothing less significant
than the great occult truth: ‘In the whole world of Maya one
thing only shows itself in its reality — Death!’ All
other phenomena must be traced back to their reality; all other
phenomena entering into Maya have reality behind them; death is the
single reality in Maya for it consists in the fact that
something was cut off from reality and taken into Maya. That is why
death is the one and only reality in Maya. And now if we turn from
the universal Maya to the great principles of the world, a very
important and essential consequence of this statement presents itself
to occult science from yet another side, that in our world of Maya,
Death is the only reality. We can begin by considering the beings of
the other kingdoms surrounding us. We may ask: do minerals die? To
the occultist there could be no sense in saying that minerals die. It
would he just the same as saying that our fingernails die when
we cut them. The finger-nail is nothing which s complete being has
claim to existence; but it is part of us, and when we/cut it off we
separate it from ourselves, tear it away from the life it has in
connection with us. In reality it dies only when we ourselves die. In
the same sense, according to occult science, the minerals do
not die. They are merely members of one great organism, just as a
finger-nail is a member of our own, and although a mineral may appear
to perish, it is in reality only severed from this great organism,
just as the piece of finger-nail is severed from our organism when we
trim it off. The destruction of a mineral is no death for the mineral
has no life in itself, but only in the great organism of which it is
a member. The plant as such is not independent; it is a member
— not of one great organism, like the mineral — but of
the whole organism of the earth. To occult observation there would be
no sense in speaking of individual plant-organisms, only of the
organism of the earth of which the plants everywhere form part. And
when we put them to death it is just as when we cut away one of our
finger-nails. We cannot say that the finger-nail has died. Just as
little can we say that of the plants; for they belong to a great
organism that is identical with the whole earth, and that is an
organism which falls asleep in spring, sending forth the plants as
its organ towards the Sun; and in Autumn it takes them back into
itself when it gathers their seeds into itself. There is no sense in
considering the plants as independent, for the whole earth organism
does not die when its separate plants fade — just as we
ourselves do not die when our hair goes grey, although we cannot
restore it its natural colour even if we dye it.
We are, however, in a
different position from the plants. But the earth may in this respect
be compared to a man who could restore his grey hair to its natural
colour. The earth does not die; what is observed in the fading of the
plants is a process that takes place on the surface. So we can never
say that the plants really die. And even of the animals we cannot
actually say that they die, as we die. For in reality a separate
animal does not exist; what really exists is its group-soul, which is
in the super-sensible world. The reality of the animals is only to be
found on the astral plane as group-soul, and the individual animal is
condensed out of that. The death of an animal means the casting off a
member of the group-soul, which replaces it by another.
Thus what we encounter
at death in the mineral, plant, and animal kingdoms is only
apparent death, only in the world of Maya is that
‘death’. In reality man alone dies, for he has developed
his individuality so far that it descends into his physical body, in
which during the earth-existence he must become real. In reality
death has only meaning for the Earth-existence of man.
If we grasp this we
must say: Man alone can truly experience death. Thus for man there
is, as we learn through occult research, a real overcoming of death,
a real victory over death. For every other being death is only
apparent, and does not in reality exist. If again we were to
ascend higher — from man to the Beings of the Higher
Hierarchies — we should find that they do not know death in the
human sense; so that in reality actual death, that is death on the
physical plane, comes only to those beings who have to acquire
something on that plane. Now man has to acquire his
ego-consciousness there. Without death he could never find it.
Neither with respect to the beings below man in rank, nor to those
higher than man, is there any meaning in speaking of actual death.
But on the other hand as regards the Being whom we call the
‘Christ-Being’ it must clearly be impossible to
obliterate his most significant earth deed. For indeed we have seen
that the most essential event to be considered in connection with the
Christ-Being is the Mystery of Golgotha; that is, the conquest of
death by life. But where can this conquest of death alone be
accomplished? Can it be accomplished in the higher worlds? No! For
even as regards the lower beings referred to as the mineral, plant
and animal kingdoms — as they have their beings in the higher,
super-sensible worlds — we cannot speak of death. And in the
course of our studies this winter we shall further show that neither
among the Higher Beings can there be a question of death; only of
change, metamorphosis, transformation. Only with regard to man can we
speak of the incision into life that we call ‘death.’ Man
can only experience this death on the physical plane. If man had
never descended to the physical plane, he would know nothing of
death; for no being who has not trodden the physical plane knows
anything about death. In other worlds there is no such thing as that
which we call death, nothing but transformation, metamorphosis.
Would Christ undergo death He must descend to the physical plane!
There alone could He experience it.
Thus we see that even
in the historical development of man, the realities of the higher
worlds play their part in Maya, in a remarkable way. Whereas
concerning every other historical event we can only interpret it
correctly by saying: ‘This historical event took place here on
the physical plane, but the cause of it is up above in the spiritual
world, we must look for that’; we cannot say of the event of
Golgotha, ‘this event is here below on the physical plane and
something corresponding to it exists in the higher worlds’.
Christ Himself belongs to the higher worlds and came down to the
physical plane. But there is no prototype above of what was
accomplished on Golgotha, such as we must look for with respect to
other historical events. That was enacted on the physical plane
alone! Among the many proofs of this fact which occult science is
able to provide, is the following: That the event of Damascus will,
in the course of the next three thousand years, as we have often
said, be renewed for an ample multitude of mankind. This means, that
capacities will be developed in man which will enable him to
perceive the Christ as an etheric figure of the astral plane, as Paul
saw Him on the road to Damascus. The event on of man gradually
becoming able to perceive the Christ by means of the higher faculties
which will be developed in the next three thousand years, has its
beginnings in the 20th century. From now on these capacities will
gradually spread, and in the course of that span of time a vast
number of persons will know, by personal vision into the higher
worlds, that Christ is a reality; that He lives; they will learn to
know Him in the life He lives now. And not only will they know the
nature of His present life, but they will also be convinced just as
Paul was — that He died, and rose again. But the foundation for
this cannot be laid in the higher worlds: it must be laid on the
physical plane. Thus if anyone comes to have an understanding of
these things, if even at the present time he understands that the
development of Christ Himself is progressing — and that
at the same time certain human capacities are also developing,
if his understanding of modern Anthroposophy has taught him this,
then there is nothing to prevent him, when he has passed through the
portal of death, from taking part in this event when it actually
appears as a first shining forth of Christ in the world of man. So
that a man who prepares himself in his physical body to-day for this
event, may be able to experience it in the intermediate life,
between death and re-birth. But those who do not prepare for it, who
acquire no understanding in this incarnation, will, in the life
immediately following this — the life between death and
re-birth--know nothing of what is taking place with respect to the
Christ for the next three thousand years from our present century.
They will have to wait until they are again incarnated and then make
necessary preparations on the earth. The death at Golgotha, which is
enacted on earth as the origin of all the subsequent Christ
development can only be understood in the physical body. Of all the
facts important to our higher life, this alone is comprehensible in
the physical body. It is then further developed and perfected in the
higher worlds, but we must first have understood it while in the
physical body. Just as the Mystery of Golgotha could never have taken
place in the higher worlds and has no prototype there, but is an
event which — since it includes death--is confined to the
physical plane, so, too must the comprehension of it be acquired on
this plane. Indeed, it is one of the tasks of man on earth to acquire
this understanding first in some one of his incarnations.
So that we must say:
we have found pre-eminently on the physical plane something which
displays an undeniable reality, a direct truth. What then is real on
the physical plane? On the physical plane so that we can stand by it,
we have a reality, death — death in the world of man, not in
the other kingdoms of nature. When we wish to study the historical
events that occur in the course of the earth's development, we must
look for a spiritual prototype for each one of them — but not
for the Mystery of Golgotha! There we have something which in itself
directly belongs to the world of Reality!
Now it is extremely
interesting that another aspect of what has just been said, can also
be seen. It is really remarkably significant to observe that this
event of Golgotha as a real event is to-day denied, and that people
say — speaking of external history — that it cannot
be proved by any historical connection. Among vital historical facts
there is hardly one so difficult to prove on external realistic,
historical grounds, as the Mystery of Golgotha. Just think how easy
it is in comparison with this to work on historical ground if we wish
to prove the existence of a Socrates, a Plato, or any of the Greek
heroes, in so far as they were of significance to the progress of man
in the external world, and how up to a certain point it is perfectly
justifiable to say that ‘no history can assert that there ever
was a Jesus of Nazareth!’ This statement cannot be
contradicted historically! This cannot be dealt with like other
historical facts. It is very remarkable that this Event, which
occurred on the external physical plane, has this in common with all
super-sensible facts: they cannot be ‘proved’. Much the
same people who deny the existence of a super-sensible world lack the
capacity for grasping this fact, which is not super-sensible. Its
existence can be surmised by its effects. But, these people think
that effects such as these might also appear, even without the real
event having occurred in history; and they attribute these effects to
sociological relations. To one who knows the inner course of the
world's development, the idea that effects such as these produced by
Christianity could be brought about without having a power behind
them, is just as wise as it would be to say cabbages could grow in a
field without having been sown there I Indeed we might go yet
further, and admit that it was not possible for those who took part
in the final shaping of the Gospels to prove, the historical event of
the Mystery of Golgotha — as historical event — on
historical grounds! For it took place leaving hardly any trace
perceptible to outer observation. Do you know how those who took part
in the later compiling of the Gospels convinced themselves as to
these events, with the exception of the writer of the John-Gospel,
who was an immediate contemporary? They could not above all
convince themselves by historical documents, for they had nothing but
oral traditions and the Mystery-Books, as is set forth in
Christianity as a Mystical Fact. They were able to convince
themselves of the actual existence of Christ Jesus by the
constellations, for they were then still very learned as to the
connection between the Macrocosm and the Microcosm. They knew how to
set up a map of the heavens for that point of the world's history (as
can still be done to-day); and they concluded: if the stars were in
such and such a position, then He whom they call the Christ must have
lived on earth at that time. In this very way the writers of the
Gospel of Matthew, Mark and Luke convinced themselves of the
historical happenings; they obtained the rest clairvoyantly. But
first they convinced themselves in the same way as we can make sure
to-day that any particular event will happen on the earth; by the
position of the constellations in the Macrocosm. Anyone who
knows anything of this cannot but believe in them. It is a fruitless
task to prove the inaccuracy of what is brought against the
historical status of the Gospels. Rather should we, as
anthroposophists, understand that we must take a very different
stand: one which is only possible through an insight into occult
science.
With reference to this
I should just like to mention a point I already endeavoured to
establish elsewhere. That is, that the realities of which
Anthroposophy speaks cannot be injured by any objections,
however correct these may be in themselves; no matter how correctly
people may argue from the knowledge they themselves may possess.
Anthroposophy cannot be contradicted. In the lecture I gave
here, entitled: ‘How can Theosophy be established?’ I
made use of the example of the little boy in a village whose duty it
was to fetch rolls for the family breakfast. Now in that village each
roll cost two kreuzers and he was always given ten kreuzers. The
baker gave him a number of rolls, and being no great arithmetician,
he did not trouble to count them, but brought them home. But a
foster-son entered the family and was sent for the rolls instead of
the other boy. This lad was a good reckoner and he said to himself:
‘I have been given ten kreuzers, each roll costs two kreuzers,
therefore I must bring home five rolls’; off he went, bringing
back six rolls. He said to himself: ‘This must be wrong, I
ought not to have so many, and as my reckoning is correct, to-morrow
I must only bring back five rolls’. The next day he took the
ten kreuzers, and again he received six rolls. The reckoning was
correct — only it did not correspond with the reality; for that
was a different matter. The reality was that it was the custom in
that place to give six rolls instead of five to anyone who spent ten
kreuzers. The boy's argument was quite correct; but did not accord
with reality.
In like manner the
cleverest thought-out objections to Anthroposophy may all agree with
each other, yet need have nothing to do with the reality; for
‘reality’ may be based on very different foundations. The
example quoted is quite practical, and serves to explain, even
scientifically, what is correctly calculated, and what is actual
fact.
We have tried to trace
the world of Maya back to the realities and in doing so we have shewn
that all Fire is sacrifice, everything of the nature of Air is the
generous flowing virtue of giving, and Fluid the results of
renunciation and resignation. To these three truths we have to-day
added the fact that the true essence of the earth or solid matter is
death, like the cutting off of any substance from its cosmic purpose.
Because this has occurred death itself has entered the world of Maya
or illusion as a reality. Even the Gods themselves could not taste
death at all without descent into the physical world in order to
comprehend death in the physical world, the world of Maya, or
illusion. This is what I wished to add to-day to the concepts we have
already formed. But once more let it be said that if we wish to
arrive at a clear understanding of these concepts which are so
necessary, and if we are thoroughly to enter into the various ideas
in St. Mark's Gospel, the only possible way of doing so is by careful
meditation and by bringing these things again and again before the
soul. The Gospel of St. Mark can only be understood if based on the
greatest and most significant cosmic conceptions.
|