Lecture I
Dornach, August 6, 1920
I must begin
with the gratifying observation that upon my return
[ Note 1 ]
I encountered a great
many friends who are here in Dornach for the first time. They
have come to inform themselves about what goes on in Dornach
and what is meant to proceed from here into our
anthroposophical movement. I cordially welcome all the newly
arrived friends and hope that because of their stay with us
they can carry back with them many new inspirations. Among
the friends we can greet once again are many we have not seen
for years. This fact along with much else undoubtedly
indicates the difficulties of the age in which we live. I
have just returned from a visit in Stuttgart, which was
filled with the manifold tasks generated within our
anthroposophical sphere of work. Among other matters, it
included the ending of the first academic year of the Waldorf
School
[ Note 2 ]
founded in Stuttgart. This Waldorf School belongs to those
establishments which manifest most prominently the ideas of
our anthroposophical spiritual movement. Even though one sets
high standards for it, the completion of the first school
year has demonstrated that there is cause for satisfaction. I
can say this because it is possible to remain objective even
if one is wholeheartedly involved in the project and even if,
in a certain sense, one has been its instigator.
Above all it
is gratifying to see how the Waldorf School teaching staff
definitely understood how to proceed from a completely
anthroposophical basis, as had always been the intention.
Present-day conditions necessitated that this basis in
anthroposophy should not produce a school that teaches a
certain world view, a school in which anthroposophy would be
taught. That was never the intention. With this in mind,
therefore, we arranged the religious instruction so that
children of Protestant parents, who wished them to have
Protestant religious instruction, could be taught by a
Protestant minister; Catholic children, by a priest. Only
those who did not care to be numbered among the existing
denominations were separately taught a form of
anthroposophical religious instruction. Except for this, we
certainly never considered the founding of an institution
that teaches a specific world outlook. All efforts were
directed toward the creation of a school in which the
practical teaching impulses arising from the viewpoint and
will of our spiritual science could for once be directly
applied in the education and instruction of youth. It was our
aim that the anthroposophic impetus should be expressed not
in the content of the classes but in the way classes were
taught, in the manner in which the whole school system was
handled; that this impetus be manifested in the specific
kind, and the different methods, of instruction. Once an
anthroposophist has stimulated his classes through his
anthroposophic will, the fertilization of the teaching
process shows precisely what a vitalizing effect
anthroposophy has when it is implemented in this way.
Throughout its
first year, I always had the opportunity to observe the
progress at the Waldorf School. Again and again, I was there
for one or two weeks. I could supervise instruction and was
able to watch the development of the different classes. I
could see, for instance, how our friend, Dr. Stein,
[ Note 3 ]
succeeded in enlivening his history class for older students by
bringing anthroposophic impulses into history. Anthropology, as
taught by Fräulein Dr. von Heydebrandt in the fifth grade,
was lifted from the tedium prevailing ordinarily in our schools
by imbuing it truly with anthroposophic will. I could cite
many other instances from which you could clearly see that
without in any way teaching abstract anthroposophy the
subject matter comes alive by the method and the way it is
treated and fertilized by anthroposophy. This practical
application of anthroposophic strength of purpose shows that
anthroposophy need not remain an abstract, remote philosophy,
but can definitely influence human activity, even though we
unfortunately have little opportunity to penetrate human
affairs, except in limited areas like the Waldorf School.
Now, when we ended the first year something happened that
seemed to be only an exterior matter, but, as I am about to
explain, it was an event that had great inner significance. A
complete innovation took place. It concerned the report
cards.
The report
card system is truly one of the most miserable aspects of our
schools. In a superficial, groping manner, teachers must
grade their students from 1, 2, 3, 4 to 5 and so on,
[ Translator's Note A ]
a procedure that stifles the very nature of schools
in a most appalling way.
Our report cards are based on actual educational
psychology, on an absolutely practical application of human
psychology. At the end of the first school year, the teachers
were at the point where they were able to write a report card
for every child corresponding to its own character and
capabilities, individually indicating the possibility for
continued growth and progress. No report card was like any
other. There were no numbers indicating grades. Instead,
through the teacher's individual insight into his pupil, the
student received a characterization of his personality.
Already in the course of the first school year, the teachers
had so intimately sought to deepen their understanding of
every child's soul that they were able to write into the
report card an accompanying verse suited to each recipient's
individual character.
These report
cards are an innovation. Do not conclude, however, that it
can be imitated or readily introduced somewhere else, because
this change has been brought about by the whole spirit of the
Waldorf School and is based on the fact that the most
intensive educational psychology was practiced during the
first school year. We carefully studied what was causing
certain intimate manifestations in the faster or slower
progress of a class, and already in the course of the first
school year, we made a few discoveries that were in some ways
surprising. We learned, for example, that the whole
configuration of a class takes on a specific form if the
number of boys and girls in that class is equal. The
configuration is a quite different one if boys are in the
majority and girls in the minority, and it changes again when
there are more girls than boys in a class We have had all
these examples in our classes. These imponderables, which
elsewhere are not taken into consideration at all, are in
many ways the essential element in a class.
When one
attempts to express certain aspects of psychology, trying to
define them in so many words, he is then already past the
point that really matters. It is just the predominant and
nonsensical custom of our time that one attempts to express
things too rigidly in words. One cannot study matters
thoroughly if one wants to express them in this constrictive
word structure. One must be aware that by expressing things
in this manner they can only be indicated approximately.
Of course, we
always find ourselves in an odd position when we talk about
the results of our anthroposophically oriented movement of
spiritual science. The Waldorf School, whose teachers have
proven themselves eminently suited to their tasks, could only
justify itself because a group of human beings was gathered
together who were most competent and pedagogically most
qualified. It is unfortunate that in any effort to carry
something out in a practical sense today, one encounters,
much more than is generally realized, the one great obstacle,
namely, a lack of qualified people. Today, the world has a
paucity of people who are qualified for any real tasks in
life. In our case the difficulty would be compounded should a
second school be established. To find suitable, really
proficient individuals capable of working in the spirit of
anthroposophically oriented spiritual science would be much
more difficult because the one existing school has, of
course, already attracted all those who could seriously be
considered. Yet there can be no doubt that, for once,
something has been accomplished in a certain area. I must
say, however, that this is like an island. There, in the
course of the first school year, a spiritual system of
education has become manifest which truly evolved from the
fundamentals of anthroposophy. It is an island, however,
enclosed within its shores. Beyond these shores, the
financial and economic connections of the school are affected
by the great decline in the economic and political life of
the present. This is where the problems lie. We can see that
our prospects are not what they should be; they are not as
good as they should be considering the nature of our
achievement. Yet does anyone have even a slight understanding
of what the Waldorf School has created based on the
spirit?
The Waldorf
School was founded by our friend Molt
[ Note 2 ]
so that the children of the
Waldorf Astoria Works could receive an education. Already in
the first year, many children from the outside, who were
unconnected to the factory, became students at the school;
there must have been around 280 of them. Now, many new
students have been registered, but from the Waldorf Astoria
Works we have no more than were previously here, as well as
the few who have meanwhile reached school age. If everything
goes really well, and if economic and other problems can be
solved, we shall, judging from the present applications, have
more than four hundred students in our school. This means we
shall have to build, hire more teachers, establish parallel
classes. All this must happen! In a certain sense it will be
a crucial test as to whether the financial understanding of
our needs by those involved can keep pace with what induces
so many people from the outside to bring us their children.
It was somewhat ironical to me when the mother of one of our
students was introduced to me in the school corridor as Frau
Minister So and So. Even those connected with the present
government are bringing their children to the Waldorf School
now!
Some of these
matters actually should be studied more closely in their
social context as well. Then, perhaps, it would be possible
to perceive the real needs of our society and how they are
met by institutions such as the Waldorf School.
Now and then
the Waldorf School was beset by a certain superficiality that
is a characteristic of our times, as I have often pointed
out. The leadership of the school was naturally confronted
with people here and there who wanted to visit for a while,
that is to snoop around a bit. Yet there is really not all
that much to see. What does matter is the whole spirit at
work in the school, and that is simply the anthroposophical
spirit. People who can't make the effort to read
anthroposophic books and who hope to set something from
scouting round in the Waldorf School would be better served
by deepening their knowledge of anthroposophy. For what
bestows spirit on the Waldorf School and lies at its very
foundation can only be seen in the spiritual impulses that
are the Basis of anthroposophical spiritual life. I have
often pointed out to those who have been attending my
lectures for some time that today the anthroposophic
spiritual life is not directed only toward the individual who
seeks the way out of his soul's distress and life's
afflictions in the spiritual forces of the world. Today,
spiritual science must address itself to the need and decline
of our time. Then, however, the comprehension of what
spiritual science has to offer will be met by that special
kind of understanding that a person today can generally bring
to anything of a spiritual nature. When talking about
spiritual science, it is often necessary to speak in an
entirely different language than is customary. One could say
that in a certain sense words acquire a new meaning through
spiritual science. It is absolutely necessary to feel and to
sense this.
Today I would
like to acquaint you with some things that can illustrate how
essential it is not only to be willing to hear a somewhat
different world view expressed in customary terminology, but
to learn to receive the words differently with one's
feelings.
Let us begin
with a specific case. When speaking about any ideology today,
it is designated by an abstract name: materialism, idealism,
spiritualism, and so forth, and people are quite sure that
they can say which is correct, and which is incorrect. A
materialist comes to a spiritualist, for example, and
explains to him his way of thinking, how he sees man's
thoughts and feelings as products of the brain. The
spiritualist answers, “You think incorrectly. I can
refute that logically!” Or, perhaps, “That is
contradicted by the facts!” In short, the crux of the
matter is that today, when people talk about issues
concerning world views, one ideology is said to be right and
the other one wrong. The spiritualist presumes that only he
has the correct philosophy, and wishes to prove the
materialist wrong and convince him that he would be better
off if he became a spiritualist.
Spiritual
science has nothing to do with such a way of proceeding. It
does not wish to lead to a different logical insight from
that of other world views. Spiritual science, if it really
fulfills its task, must become action based on insight. In
spiritual science, knowledge must turn into action, action in
the whole cosmic world context. I will explain this by using
a few definite examples. Today, when people look at the world
naively but with a slight materialist tendency, when they
direct their eyes and ears outward, hear sounds, notice
colors, experience warmth and similar sensations, they
perceive the external material world. Should they become
scientists, or merely absorb through popular means what
science wishes to represent, they will then form or simply
accept certain concepts that have originated through the
combination of all the color, sound and warmth elements and
others that are to be observed in the external world. Now,
there are people who maintain that everything one sees is, in
the first place, only an external phenomenon. Yet this idea
is generally not gone into thoroughly enough. People see a
rainbow, for example. As a result of their education, when
they look at the rainbow, they are already convinced that the
rainbow is only an apparition, that they cannot go to the
place where the rainbow is, neatly put a foot on it and march
along the rainbow bridge as if it were a solid object. People
are sure that it cannot be done, that the rainbow is merely
an apparition, a phenomenon that arises and then disappears
again. They are convinced that they deal only with
apparitions because they cannot come into contact with this
aspect of the external world through their sense of touch and
feeling. According to their view, as soon as something can be
grasped or touched, it is no longer a phenomenon to the same
degree, even though recent philosophy may in some instances
claim that it is. In any case, the impressions of the sense
of touch, for instance, are intuitively taken as something
that guarantees a different external reality than the
phenomenal realities of the rainbow.
This
notwithstanding, all that our external senses perceive
comprises merely a world of phenomena, modified perhaps in
respect to the apparition of the rainbow, but a world of
phenomena nevertheless. Regardless of how far we direct our
gaze, how far we can hear, in whatever is seen, heard or
otherwise perceived, we deal only with phenomena. I have
attempted to explain this in the introduction to the third
volume of Goethe's scientific writings.
[ Note 4 ]
We deal with a tapestry of
phenomena. Whoever makes an effort through experimentation or
any combination of pure reasoning to find matter in the realm
of appearances is pursuing a dead end.
[ Translator's Note B ]
There is no matter out
there. One deals only with a world of phenomena.
This is
precisely what the whole spirit of spiritual science reveals:
In the external world, one deals only with a world of
appearances. An exponent of a current world outlook will
therefore conclude that it is wrong to look for matter at all
in the realm of phenomena. Anthroposophy cannot agree with
this attitude; it must put it differently by saying: Because
of the whole configuration of man's mind, he comes to the
point where he wants to seek for matter in the moving
tapestry of phenomena, to seek out there for atoms, molecules
and so on, which are resting points in the phenomenon. Some
picture these as tiny, miniature pellets, others imagine them
to be points of energy and are proud of the fact; others,
prouder still, think of them as mathematical fiction.
What is
important, however, is not whether one thinks of them as
small pellets, sources of energy, or mathematical fiction,
but whether one thinks of the external world in atomistic
terms. This is what is important. For a spiritual scientist,
however, it is not merely wrong to think atomistically. The
kind of concept determining rightness or wrongness may be
sound logic, but it is abstract, and spiritual science has to
do with realities. I urge you to take it very seriously when
I say that spiritual science has to do with realities!
This is why
certain concepts that have become merely logical categories
for today's abstract world-view must be replaced by something
real. This is why, in spiritual science, we not only say that
one who seeks atoms or molecules in the external world thinks
in the wrong way; we must consider this manner of thinking an
unhealthy, sick thinking. We must replace the merely logical
concept of wrongness with the realistic concept of sickness,
of unhealthiness. We must point to a definite sickness of
soul — regardless of how many people it has seized
— which expresses itself in atomistic thinking. This
condition is one of feeblemindedness. It is not merely
logically wrong for us, it is an expression of
feeblemindedness to think atomistically; in other words, it
is feebleminded to seek in the external world something other
than phenomena which, when it comes right down to it, are an
a par with the phenomenon of the rainbow. It is relatively
easy for people with other world outlooks to set things
straight: they do it by refutation. To have been able to
refute something is considered an accomplishment. Yet, in a
spiritual-scientific sense, no final conclusion has been
reached by refutation; it is important to refer to the
healthy or unhealthy soul life, to actual processes expressed
in man's whole physical, soul and spiritual being. To think
atomistically is to think unhealthily, not merely
erroneously. An actual unhealthy process takes place in the
human organism when we think atomistically. This is one thing
we must become clear about regarding the phenomena of the
external world and its character of appearance.
We must also
become clear about our inner life. Many people seek the
spirit inwardly. To begin with, the spiritual cannot be found
in the inner realm of man. Truly objective evaluation of
every abstract form of mysticism bears this out. What today
is sometimes — nay, often — called mysticism
consists of brooding over one's inner self, attempting to
seek self-knowledge by introverted brooding. What is
discovered by practicing such one-sided mysticism? One
certainly finds interesting things. When we look into the
human being and find all those inwardly pleasant experiences
arising which we call mystical — what are they really?
They are just the very things that point us toward material
existence. We do not discover matter in the external world
where the sense phenomena are found; we come upon matter in
our inner being. This brings us to the point where we can
characterize these things correctly. Regarded from the most
comprehensive point of view, it is the body's metabolism that
seethes and boils there within the human interior and which
flames up into consciousness as one-sided mysticism, mistaken
by many to be the spirit that can be found in the inner self.
It is not the spirit, it is the flame of metabolism within
man. We find matter not in the external world, we find it in
ourselves. We find it precisely through one-sided mysticism.
That is why a great many people who do not want to be
materialists deceive themselves. They excuse their not
wanting to be materialists by saying, “Out there is
base matter; I shall rise above it and turn to my inner
being, for there I will find the spirit.”
Actually,
spirit is neither without nor within. Outside are the
interweaving phenomena; within ourselves is matter,
constantly seething and boiling substance. This metabolic
processing of matter kindles the flames that leap into
consciousness and form the mystic impressions. Mysticism is
the inwardly perceived corporeal matter of the metabolism.
That is something that cannot be logically refuted, but must
be traced back to actual processes when man yields in a
one-sided way to the metabolism.
Just as the
belief that it is possible to find traces of matter in the
external world indicates feeblemindedness — that is, a
real illness of the spirit, soul and bodily being of
man — so does one-sided preoccupation with mysticism
indicate a corporeal indisposition. It points toward
something that sounds somewhat insulting if put bluntly. Yet
we must use an expression that is, as it were, spoken from
yonder side of the Guardian of the Threshold and means,
“Childishness.” In the same way that one incurs
feeblemindedness through atomistic thinking concerning the
outer world, one becomes childish when yielding to a
mysticism that wants to feel the spirit in the seething of
the inner metabolism.
Childishness,
of course, has a good side, too. When we observe the child we
see a lot of spirit in it, and geniality in many instances
consists in man's preserving the childlike spirit all the way
into advanced age. When we look at the world from the other
side of the threshold we can see that it is the spirit which,
for instance, forms the child's brain, that spirit which
accompanies us from the spiritual world when we enter the
physical world through conception or birth. This spirit is
most active in the child. Later, it is lost. Therefore, the
word childishness is not meant as an insult in this instance,
it merely denotes that spirit which forms the brain out of a
more or less chaotic mass. Later on, however, if this spirit,
which actually shapes the child's brain, does not pour itself
sufficiently into logicality, into experience, into what life
presents; if, instead, it acts in a one-sided manner and
excludes the individual physical experiences; if it goes on
working in the way it did during the first seven years, then
instead of becoming intellectually mature one becomes
childish. Childishness is frequently found to be a
characteristic of a great many mystics, particularly arrogant
ones. They wish to weave and live in that spirit which is
really what should be active in the child's organism. They
have retained this spirit, however, and, greatly impressed by
their own accomplishment, they gaze at it in wonder in their
consciousness, believing, in their one-sided, abstract
mysticism, that they are perceiving a higher spirituality,
when it is only the matter of their own metabolism.
Again, we do
not need merely to refute the one-sided mystic if we are
really well grounded in an anthroposophically oriented
spiritual science. We must show that it is the sign of an
ailing constitution of the spirit, soul and body when man
broods one-sidedly within his inner being, thereby attempting
to find the spirit.
I have drawn
these two examples, familiar to you from anthroposophical
literature, in order to point out to you how serious from a
certain viewpoint matters can become when, leaving the
ordinary spiritual life of today, one immerses oneself in
anthroposphical spiritual life. There, one no longer deals
with something as insignificant as “right” or
“wrong.” It now becomes a question of
“healthy” or “sick” conditions in the
organic functions. Thus, on a higher level, something that
goes in one direction must be considered healthy, while
something going in another direction must be considered sick.
I would like you to understand from these implications how
spiritual science is an active knowledge; how it cannot stand
still on the level of the nature of ordinary knowledge but
becomes something real. The process of knowledge, insofar as
it expresses itself in spiritual science, is something that
actually takes place in the human organism.
In a similar
manner we must define the element that lives in the realm of
will. When we talk of the realm of will in our age — an
age permeated by that grandiose decline we have often
discussed — when we speak of what develops into human
will impulses and try to define their character, then we say:
Man is good or evil. Again, we are dealing with ethical
categories — good and evil — which are just as
necessary, of course, as logical categories. Yet, from what
arises out of the impulses of spiritual science, it is not
merely a question of what is meant when one action of man is
designated as good and another as evil. When one calls a
human action good, even in a karmic connection, it is a
question of balancing in some way or other the good with the
evil. We refer to something that pertains to an ethical
judgment of man.
Whenever we
rise into the realm of the spiritual scientific, it is much
more a question of recognizing that what is at work there is
a certain manner of thinking, feeling and willing for human
beings which leads upward to a fruitful development, to
progress in evolution. On the one hand, we have abstract
goodness. It is of outstanding moral value, but even that is
ethically abstract. When it is a matter of
spiritual-scientific impulses, however, man must not only do
good, or only do the good which lets him appear as an
ethically good person. He can do, think or feel only that
which advances the world in its development in the external
sense world; or he can do something that is not merely evil,
leading to an ethical condemnation, but has a destructive
effect on the world forces. This was already meant to be
indicated in the
Portal of Initiation,
[ Note 5 ]
where Strader and Capesius are
speaking and the following is pointed out: Everything that is
done here in the sense world and is subject to ethical
judgments of good and evil turns into phenomena behind the
curtains of existence, having either a progressive,
constructive effect or a destructive one, leading to decline.
Just try to experience this entire scene that is permeated
with thunder and lightning, where things are happening in a
most realistic manner in the soul world while Capesius and
Strader are discussing one or the other matter. Try to
re-experience this scene and you will see how what we
experience as the ethical sphere here on the physical plane
is in reality very different there.
All this is to
show you how serious world aspects become in that instance
when, upon leaving today's customary way of judging by
logical or outward human categories only, one ascends to the
realities that confront us when we view the world from the
spiritual scientific standpoint. Things become serious, yet
they must be mentioned today because the world now demands a
new kind of spiritual life. Things are happening in the world
today that everyone sees but that nobody wishes to comprehend
in their actual significance because one cannot take the step
from external abstraction to reality. I want to give you a
few other examples.
You find today
that you live in a world where, among much else, there exist,
for example in the social field, a great many party
organizations — liberal, conservative and many other
parties. Human beings are unaware of the actual nature of
these parties. When they have to vote, they decide on one or
the other party. They do not give much thought to what it
really is that exists as party policy, pulsating through all
of public life. They are incapable of taking these things
seriously. There are quite a number of people who, in the
nicest superficial manner, repeat all sorts of Orientalisms
about the external world as Maya, but when it really comes to
doing something in this external world they do not stick to
what they repeat so abstractly. Otherwise, they would ask,
“Maya? Then these parties must be Maya too. Then what
is the reality to which this Maya points?”
If this matter
is pursued in a spiritual-scientific way in more
detail — and tomorrow we shall go deeper into this topic
— one finds that these parties exist in the external
world by having programs and principles, that is, they pursue
abstract ideas. Everything that lives in the external
physical world, however, is always the replica, the
reflection of what is present as a reality in a much more
intense form in the spiritual world. Here is the physical
world (see drawing, red), but everything in it points toward
the spiritual, and only above, in the spiritual world, can
the actual reality of these physical things be found (red).
Down here, for instance, you find the parties (orange). On
the earth, they oppose each other, seeking to gather a great
number of people under the umbrella of an abstract program.
Then what are these parties a reflection of? What is up there
in the spiritual world if these parties down here are Maya?
No abstractions exist in the spiritual world above, only
beings. Yet, political parties are rooted in abstraction.
Above, one cannot profess adherence to a party program; there
one can only be a follower of this or that being or
hierarchy. There one cannot just subscribe to a program on
the basis of the intellect; that cannot happen there. One
must belong with one's whole being to another entity. What is
abstract down here is being above that is, the abstract below
is only the shadow of beingness above. If you consider the
two main categories of parties, the liberal and conservative,
you know that each has its own program. When you look above
to see what each is a reflection of, then you discover that
ahrimanic being is projected here (see drawing, lower part)
into the conservative views, luciferic being in the liberal
thoughts. Down here, one follows a liberal or conservative
program; up there, one is a follower of an ahrimanic or a
luciferic being of some hierarchy.
It can happen,
however, that the moment you pass across the threshold it
becomes necessary really to understand all this clearly, and
neither be fooled by words nor succumb to illusions. It is
quite easy to assume that one belongs to a certain good
being. Just because you call a being good, however, does not
make it so. Anyone can say, for instance, “I
acknowledge Jesus, the Christ,” but in the spiritual
world, one cannot follow a program. The whole manner in which
the concepts and images of this Jesus, of Christ, fill such a
person's soul indicates that it is merely the name of Jesus,
the Christ, that he has in mind. Actually he is a follower of
either Lucifer or Ahriman, but calls whichever it is by the
name of Jesus or Christ.
I ask you: How
many people today know that party opinions are shadows of
realities in the spiritual world? Some do know and act
according to their knowledge. I can point to some who know.
The Jesuits, for instance, they know. Do not think that the
Jesuits believe that when they write something
[ Note 6 ]
against anthroposophy in their
journals, for instance, they have hit upon something special
and logically irrefutable. Refutations are not what counts
there. The Jesuits know very well how their refutations could
be countered. They are not concerned with a rational fighting
for or against something, but with being followers of a
certain spiritual being which I do not wish to name today,
but which they call Jesus, their Leader, to whom they belong.
Whoever this being may be, they call it Jesus. I do not wish
to go into the facts more closely, but they call themselves
soldiers and him their Leader. They do not fight to refute,
they fight to recruit adherents for the companies, the army
of Jesus — that is, the being they call Jesus. And they
know very well that as soon as one Looks across the
threshold, abstract categories, logical approval or
disapproval no longer matter, only the hosts following one or
the other being. Down on earth it is a matter of mere figures
of speech. This is what mankind today is hardly willing to
understand, namely, that if we wish to escape from the
decline of our age it can no longer be a question of
abstractions or merely of what one may think, but that we
must deal with realities. We shall begin to ascend to
realities when we stop talking about right or wrong and begin
speaking about healthy or sick. We begin to rise to realities
when we cease talking about programs of parties or world
views, and instead speak about following real beings whom we
encounter as soon as we become aware of what exists an yonder
side of the threshold. It must be our concern today actually
to take that serious step that leads from abstraction to
reality, from merely logical knowledge to knowledge as deed.
This alone can lead us out of the chaos now gripping the
world.
The world
situation, about which we shall speak tomorrow and the day
after, can be judged in a sound way only by someone who
examines it with the means that spiritual science is prepared
to give him. Otherwise one will be unable to see in the right
light the significant, existing contrasts between East and
West. All that outwardly manifests itself in visible
realities — what else is it but the inherently absurd
expression of what lives as thoughts in people's heads? How,
then, do these thoughts manifest themselves to us?
To answer this
question and to conclude today's presentation, I would like
again to call our attention to an obvious example. More than
once, I have pointed out how Catholic clerical factions,
especially here in Switzerland, are now resorting to a web of
lies in order to destroy spiritual science. Those of you who
have been here have witnessed a number of examples of what
the Catholic Jesuits come up with in the attempt to destroy
anthroposophy. Consider the attacks made by Jesuit
seminarists with weapons that are certainly not nice. I need
not characterize this; those who have not informed themselves
can easily do so.
For
Switzerland and Central Europe, where these things happen,
are all part of the world. So, too, is America. I recently
received a magazine published in America in which
anthroposophically oriented spiritual science is
characterized, while, at the same time, the Jesuits in Europe
denounced spiritual science as a threat to the Catholic
Church and to Christianity. You know by now that Reverend Kully
[ Note 7 ]
stated that there are three evils in the world. One is Judaism,
the other Freemasonry, but the third — worse than all of
them, even worse than Bolshevism — is what is taught here
in Dornach. This originates from the Catholic side, and is how
anthroposophy is characterized.
What about
America? I want to read you a small paragraph from an
American publication written at the same time Catholic
journals over here printed their view of anthroposophy:
Just as the Catholic hierarchy has
always insisted that the Roman church is the only one with
any authority,
— Protestant sects do not come into
consideration; according to the Roman church, these sects
stand outside the gates; they are viewed merely as a great
number of heretics?
so it is self-evident that the church
which Steiner's glib tongue alludes to can be none other
than the Roman Catholic church. This assumption is
reinforced and indeed any doubt about the matter ceases,
when one reads Steiner's other occult books. They all point
to the same thing, namely, his writings are purely
misleading; the sheepskin of a superficial occultism
covering the wolf of Jesuitism.
So you see
that in America anthroposophy is taken for Jesuitism, while
in Europe the Jesuits strongly oppose anthroposophy as the
biggest enemy of the Catholic church. That is how the world
thinks today! That, however, is also how people think in
Europe where they are living side by side; they are just not
aware of it.
The American
article concludes with several more nice sentences:
Steiner claims to be an initiate. That
may be; but whether he is of the White Lodge or belongs to
the Brothers of Shadow is something one can only decide
when it is realized that he stood on the side of men of
“blood and iron” ... and that a number of his
students here (in America) were interned as German
spies.
So you see,
sometimes the wind blows from the Roman Catholic corner,
sometimes from the American side! It just shows you how
things are inside the heads of our contemporaries. Yet, from
the thoughts hatched inside human heads, there developed what
has led into the decline of the present, and the ascent must
truly be sought in a different direction from the one where
many seek it today.
Tomorrow, we
shall continue with this subject.
Translator's Notes:
A. In
the German educational system, the grade of 1 is
equivalent to an A; 4 is a D and 5 would indicate a
failing grade.
B. The
“dead end” alluded to here is the translation
of the German expression “Holzweg,”
literally, “wooden path.” Like all such
expressions in a language, it springs from real
experience. The “Holzweg” is a rough timber
road, or a system of such roads, proceeding into the
forest and used by woodcutters. It leads nowhere and may
dead-end suddenly. Hence, it would be easy to get lost on
it.
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