II
Moral Qualities and the Life After Death.
Windows of the Earth.
Dornach, December 1, 1922
THE essential purpose of the lectures I have been giving
here for some weeks past was to show how through his spiritual
life man partakes in what we may call the world of the Stars,
just as through his physical life on Earth he partakes in
earthly existence, earthly happenings. In the light of the
outlook acquired through Anthroposophy we distinguish in man
the forces that lie in his physical body and in his etheric or
formative-forces body, and those that lie in his Ego and his
astral body. You know, of course, that these two sides of his
being are separated whenever he sleeps. And now we will think
for a short time of a man while he is asleep. On the one side
the physical body and the etheric body lie there in a state of
unconsciousness; but the Ego and the astral body are also
without consciousness.
We
may now ask: Are these two unconscious sides of human nature
also related during sleep? — We know indeed that in the
waking state, where the ordinary consciousness of modern man
functions, the two sides are related through thinking, through
feeling and through willing. We must therefore picture to
ourselves that when the Ego and astral body plunge down, as it
were, into the etheric body and the physical body, thinking,
feeling, and willing arise from this union.
Now
when man is asleep, thinking, feeling, and willing cease. But
when we consider his physical body we shall have to say: All
the forces which, according to our human observation belong to
Earth-existence are active in this physical body. This physical
body can be weighed; put it on scales and it will prove to have
a certain weight. We can investigate how material processes
take their course within it — or at least we can imagine
hypothetically that this is possible. We should find in it
material processes that are a continuation of those processes
to be found outside in Earth-existence; these continue within
man's physical body in the process of nutrition. In his
physical body we should also find what is achieved through the
breathing process. It is only what proceeds from the
head-organization of man, all that belongs to the system of
senses and nerves, that is either dimmed or plunged in complete
darkness during sleep.
If
we then pass on to consider the etheric body which permeates
the physical, it is by no means so easy to understand how this
etheric body works during sleep. Anyone, however, who is
already versed to a certain extent in what Spiritual Science
has to say about man will realize without difficulty how
through his etheric body the human being lives, even while
asleep, amid all the conditions of the ether-world and all the
etheric forces surrounding existence on Earth. So that we can
say: Within the physical body of man while he is asleep,
everything that belongs to Earth-existence is active. So too in
the etheric body all that belongs to the ether-world enveloping
and permeating the Earth is active.
But
matters become more difficult when we turn our attention
— naturally our soul's attention — to what is now
(during sleep) outside the physical and etheric bodies, namely,
to the Ego and astral body of man. We cannot possibly accept
the idea that this has anything to do with the physical Earth,
or with what surrounds and permeates the Earth as ether. As to
what takes place during sleep, I indicated it to you in a more
descriptive way in the lectures given here a short time ago,
and I will outline it today from a different point of view. We
can in reality only understand what goes on in the Ego and
astral body of man when with the help of Spiritual Science we
penetrate into what takes place on and around the Earth over
and above the physical and etheric forces and activities.
To
begin with, we turn our gaze upon the plant-world. Speaking in
the general sense and leaving out of account evergreen trees
and the like — we see the plant-world sprouting out of
the Earth in spring. We see the plants becoming richer and
richer in color, more luxuriant, and then in autumn fading away
again. In a certain sense we see them disappear from the Earth
when the Earth is covered with snow.
But
that is only one aspect of the unfolding of the plant-world.
Physical knowledge tells us that this unfolding of the
plant-world in spring and its fading towards autumn is
connected with the Sun, also that, for example, the green
coloring of the plants can be produced only under the influence
of sunlight. Physical knowledge, therefore, shows us what comes
about in the realm of physical effects; but it does not show us
that while all the budding, the blossoming and withering of the
plants is going on, spiritual events are also taking place. In
reality, just as in the physical human organism there is for
example the circulation of the blood, just as etheric processes
express themselves in the physical organism as vascular action
and so forth, and just as this physical organism is permeated
by the soul and spirit, so also the processes of sprouting,
greening, blossoming and fading of the plants which we regard
as physical processes, are everywhere permeated by workings of
the cosmic world of soul and spirit.
Now
when we look into the countenance of a man and his glance falls
on us, when we see his expression, maybe the flushing of the
face, then indeed the eyes of our soul are looking right
through the physical to the soul and spirit. Indeed, it cannot
be otherwise in our life among our fellow-men. In like manner
we must accustom ourselves also to see spirit-and-soul in the
physiognomy — if I may call it so — and changing
coloring of the plant-world on our Earth.
If
we are only willing to recognize the physical, we say that the
Sun's warmth and light work upon the plants, forming in them
the saps, the chlorophyll and so forth. But if we contemplate
all this with spiritual insight, if we take the same attitude
to this plant-physiognomy of the Earth as we are accustomed to
take to the human physiognomy, then something unveils itself to
us that I should like to express with a particular word,
because this word actually conveys the reality.
The
Sun, of which we say, outwardly speaking, that it sends its
light to the Earth, is not merely a radiant globe of gas but
infinitely more than that. It sends its rays down to the Earth
but whenever we look at the Sun it is the outer side of the
rays that we see. The rays have, however, an inner side. If
someone were able to look through the Sun's light, to regard
the light only as an outer husk and look through to the soul of
it, he would behold the Soul-Power, the Soul-Being of the Sun.
With ordinary human consciousness we see the Sun as we should
see a man who was made of papier-maché. An effigy in which
there is nothing but the form, the lifeless form, is of course
something different from the human being we actually see before
us. In the case of the living human being, we see through this
outer form and perceive soul-and-spirit. For ordinary
consciousness the Sun is changed as it were into a
papier-maché cast. We do not see through its outer husk
that is woven of Light.
But
if we were able to see through this, we should see the
soul-and-spirit essence of the Sun. We can be conscious of its
activity just as we are conscious of the physical
papier-maché husk of the Sun. From the standpoint of
physical knowledge we say: ‘The Sun shines upon the Earth; it
sparkles upon the stones, upon the soil. The light is thrown
back and thereby we see everything that is mineral. The rays of
the Sun penetrate into the plants, making them green, making
them bud.’ — All that is external. If we see the
soul-and-spirit essence of the Sun, we cannot merely say: ‘The
sunlight sparkles on the minerals, is reflected, enabling us to
see the minerals,’ or, ‘The light and heat of the Sun penetrate
into the plants, making them verdant’ — but we shall have
to say, meaning now the countless spiritual Beings who people
the Sun and who constitute its soul and spirit: ‘The Sun dreams
and its dreams envelop the Earth and fashion the plants.’
If
you picture the surface of the Earth with the physical plants
growing from it, coming to blossom, you have there the working
of the physical rays of the Sun. But above it is the weaving
life of the dream-world of the Sun — a world of pure
Imaginations. And one can say: When the mantle of snow melts in
the spring, the Sun regains its power, then the
Sun-Imaginations weave anew around the Earth. These
Imaginations of the Sun are Imaginative forces, playing in upon
the world of plants. Now although it is true that this
Imaginative world — this Imaginative atmosphere
surrounding the Earth — is very specially active from
spring until autumn in any given region of the Earth,
nevertheless this dreamlike character of the Sun's activity is
also present in a certain way during the time of winter. Only
during winter the dreams are, as it were, dull and brooding,
whereas in summer they are mobile, creative, formative. Now it
is in this element in which the Sun-Imaginations unfold that
the Ego and astral body of man live and weave when they are
outside the physical and etheric bodies.
You
will realize from what I have said that sleep in summer is
actually quite a different matter from sleep in winter,
although in the present state of evolution, man's life and
consciousness are so dull and lacking in vitality that these
things go unperceived. In earlier times men distinguished very
definitely through their feelings between winter-sleep and
summer-sleep, and they knew too what meaning winter-sleep and
summer-sleep had for them. In those ancient times men knew that
of summer-sleep they could say: During the summer the Earth is
enveloped by picture-thoughts. And they expressed this by
saying: The Upper Gods come down during the summer and hover
around the Earth; during the winter the Lower Gods ascend out
of the Earth and hover around it. — This Imaginative
world, differently constituted in winter and in summer, was
conceived as the weaving of the Upper and the Lower Gods. But
in those olden times it was also known that man himself, with
his Ego and his astral body, lives in this world of weaving
Imaginations.
Now
the very truths of which I have here spoken, show us, if we
ponder them in the light of Spiritual Science, in what
connection man stands, even during his earthly existence, with
the extra-earthly Universe. You see, in summer — when it
is summer in any region of the Earth — the human being
during his sleep is always woven around by a sharply contoured
world of Cosmic Imaginations. The result is that during the
time of summer he is, so to speak, pressed near to the Earth
with his soul and spirit. During the time of winter it is
different. During winter the contours, the meshes, of the
Cosmic Imaginations widen out, as it were. During the summer we
live with our Ego and astral body while we are asleep within
very clearly defined Imaginations, within manifold figures and
forms. During winter the figures around the Earth are
wide-meshed and the consequence of this is that whenever autumn
begins, that which lives in our Ego and astral body is borne
far out into the Universe by night. During summer and its heat,
that which lives in our Ego and astral body remains more, so to
speak, in the psycho-spiritual atmosphere of the human world.
During winter this same content is borne out into the far
distances of the Universe. Indeed without speaking
figuratively, since one is saying something that is quite real,
one can say: that which man cultivates in himself, in his soul,
and which through his Ego and astral body he can draw out from
his physical and etheric bodies between the times of going to
sleep and waking — that stores itself up during the
summer and streams out during winter into the wide expanse of
the Cosmos.
Now
we cannot conceive that we men shut ourselves away, as it were,
in earthly existence and that the wide Universe knows nothing
of us. It is far from being so. True, at the time of Midsummer
man can conceal himself from the Spirits of the Universe, and
he may also succeed in harboring reprehensible feelings of
evil. The dense net of Imaginations does not let these feelings
through; they still remain. And at Christmastime the Gods look
in upon the Earth and everything that lives in man's nature is
revealed and goes forth with his Ego and astral being. Using a
picture which truly represents the facts, we may say: In winter
the windows of the Earth open and the Angels and Archangels
behold what men actually are on the Earth.
We
on Earth have gradually accustomed ourselves in modern
civilization to express all that we allow to pass as knowledge
in humdrum, dry, unpoetic phrases. The higher Beings are ever
poets, therefore we never give a true impression of their
nature if we describe it in barren physical words; we must
resort to words such as I have just now used: at Christmastime
the Earth's windows open and through these windows the Angels
and Archangels behold what men's deeds have been the whole year
through. The Beings of the higher Hierarchies are poets and
artists even in their thinking. The logic we are generally at
pains to apply is only an outcome of the Earth's gravity
— by which I do not at all imply that it is not highly
useful on Earth.
It
is what lives in the minds and hearts of men as I have just
pictured it, that is of essential interest to these higher
Beings; the Angels who look in through the Christmas windows
are not interested in the speculations of professors; they
overlook them. Nor, to begin with, are they much concerned with
a man's thoughts. It is what goes on in his feelings, in his
heart, that in its cosmic aspect is connected with the Sun's
yearly course. So it is not so much whether we are foolish or
clever on Earth that comes before the gaze of the
Divine-Spiritual Beings at the time of Christmas, but simply
whether we are good or evil men, whether we feel for others or
are egoists. That is what is communicated to the cosmic worlds
through the course of the yearly seasons.
You
may believe that our thoughts remain near the Earth, because I
have said that the Angels and Archangels are not concerned with
them when they look in through the Christmas windows. They are
not concerned with our thoughts because, if I may use a rather
prosaic figure of speech, they receive the richer coinage, the
more valuable coinage that is minted by the soul-and-spirit of
man. And this more valuable coinage is minted by the heart, the
feelings, by what a man is worth because of what his heart and
feeling contain. For the Cosmos, our thoughts are only the
small change, the lesser coinage, and this lesser coinage is
spied out by subordinate spiritual beings every night. Whether
we are foolish or clever is spied out for the Cosmos every
night — not indeed for the very far regions of the Cosmos
but only for the regions around the Earth — spied out by
beings who are closest to the Earth in its environment and
therefore the most subordinate in rank. The daily revolution of
the Sun takes place in order to impart to the Cosmos the worth
of our thoughts. Thus far do our thoughts extend; they belong
merely to the environment of the Earth. The yearly revolution
of the Sun takes place in order to carry our heart-nature, our
feeling-nature, farther out into the cosmic worlds.
Our
will-nature cannot be carried in this way out into the Cosmos,
for the cycle of the day is strictly regulated. It runs its
course in twenty-four hours. The yearly course of the Sun is
strictly regulated too. We perceive the regularity of the daily
cycle in the strictly logical sequences of our thoughts. The
regularity of the yearly cycle — we perceive the
after-effect of this in our heart and soul, in that there are
certain feelings which say to one thing that a man does: it is
good, and to another: it is bad.
But
there is a third faculty in man, namely, the will. True,
the will is bound up with feeling, and feeling cannot but say
that certain actions are morally good, and others morally not
good. But the will can do what is morally good and also what is
morally not good. Here, then, there is no strict regularity.
The relation of our will to our nature as human beings is not
strictly regulated in the sense that thinking and feeling are
regulated. We cannot call a bad action good, or a good action
bad, nor can we call a logical thought illogical, an illogical
thought logical. This is due to the fact that our thoughts
stand under the influence of the daily revolution of the Sun,
our feelings under the influence of its yearly revolution. The
will, however, is left in the hands of humanity itself on
Earth. And now a man might say: ‘The most that happens to me is
that if I think illogically, my illogical thoughts are carried
out every night into the Cosmos and do mischief there —
but what does that matter to me? I am not here to bring order
into the Cosmos.’ — Here on Earth, where his life is
lived in illusion, a man might in certain circumstances speak
like this, but between death and a new birth he would never do
so. For between death and a new birth he himself is in the
worlds in which he may have caused mischief through his foolish
thoughts; and he must live through all the harm that he has
done. So, too, between death and a new birth, he is in those
worlds into which his feelings have flowed. But here again he
might say on Earth: ‘What lives in my feelings evaporates into
the Cosmos; but I leave it to the Gods to deal with any harm
that may have been caused there through me. My will, however,
is not bound on Earth by any regulation.’ —
The
materialist who considers that man's life is limited to the
time between birth and death, can never conceive that his will
has any cosmic significance; neither can he conceive that human
thoughts or feelings have any meaning for the Cosmos. But even
one who knows quite well that thoughts have a cosmic
significance as the result of the daily revolution of the Sun,
and feelings through the yearly revolution — even he,
when he sees what is accomplished on the Earth by the good or
evil will-impulses of man, must turn away from the Cosmos and
to human nature itself in order to see how what works in man's
will goes out into the Cosmos. For what works in man's will
must be borne out into the Cosmos by man himself, and he bears
it out when he passes through the gate of death. Therefore
it is not through the daily or the yearly cycles but through
the gate of death that man carries forth the good or the evil
he has brought about here on Earth through his will.
It
is a strange relationship that man has to the Cosmos in his
life of soul. We say of our thoughts: ‘We have thoughts but
they are not subject to our arbitrary will; we must conform to
the laws of the Universe when we think, otherwise we shall come
into conflict with everything that goes on in the world.’
— If a little child is standing in front of me, and I
think: That is an old man — I may flatter myself that I
have determined the thought, but I am certainly out of touch
with the world. Thus in respect of our thoughts we are by no
means independent, so little independent that our thoughts are
carried out into the Cosmos by the daily cycle of the Sun. Nor
are we independent in our life of feelings, for they are
carried out through the yearly cycle of the Sun. Thus even
during earthly life, that which lives in our head through our
thoughts and, through our feelings in our breast, does not live
only within us but also partakes in a cosmic existence. That
alone which lives in our will we keep with us until our death.
Then, when we have laid aside the body, when we have no longer
anything to do with earthly forces, we bear it forth with us
through the gate of death.
Man
passes through the gate of death laden with what has come out
of his acts of will. Just as here on Earth he has around him
all that lives in minerals, plants, animals and in physical
humanity, all that lives in clouds, streams, mountains, stars,
in so far as they are externally visible through the light
— just as he has all this around him during his existence
between birth and death, so he has a world around him when he
has laid aside the physical and etheric bodies and has passed
through the gate of death. In truth he has around him the very
world into which his thoughts have entered every night, into
which his feelings have entered with the fulfilment of every
yearly cycle ... “That thou hast thought; that thou hast
felt.” ... It now seems to him as though the Beings of
the Hierarchies were bearing his thoughts and his feelings
towards him. They have perceived it all, as I have indicated.
His mental life and his feeling-life now stream towards
him.
In
earthly existence the Sun gives light from morning to evening;
it goes down and night sets in. When we have passed through the
gate of death, our wisdom rays out towards us as day; through
our accumulated acts of folly, the spiritual lights grow dark
and dim around us and it becomes night. Here on Earth we have
day and night; when we have passed through the gate of death,
we have as day and night the results of our wisdom and our
foolishness. And what man experiences here on this Earth as
spring, summer, autumn and winter in the yearly cycle, as
changing temperatures and other sentient experiences, of all
this he becomes aware — when he has passed through the
gate of death — also as a kind of cycle, although of much
longer duration. He experiences the warmth-giving, life-giving
quality (life-giving, that is to say, for his spiritual Self)
of his good feelings, of his sympathy with goodness; he
experiences as icy cold his sympathy with evil, with the
immoral. Just as here on Earth we live through the heat of
summer and the cold of winter, so do we live after death warmed
by our good feelings, chilled by our evil feelings; and we bear
the effects of our will through these spiritual years and days.
After death we are the product of our moral nature on Earth.
And we have an environment that is permeated by our follies and
our wisdom, by our sympathies and antipathies for the good.
So
that we can say: Just as here on Earth we have the summer air
around us giving warmth and life, and as we have the cold and
frosty winter air around us, so, after death, we are surrounded
by an atmosphere of soul-and-spirit that is warm and
life-giving in so far as it is produced through our good
feelings, and chilling in so far as it is produced through our
evil feelings. Here on Earth, in certain regions at least, the
summer and winter temperatures are the same for all of us. In
the time after death, each human being has his own
atmosphere, engendered by himself. And the most moving
experiences after death are connected with the fact that one
man lives in icy cold and the other, close beside him, in
life-giving warmth.
Such are the experiences that may be undergone after death. And
as I described in my book Theosophy, one of the main
experiences passed through in the soul-world, is that those
human beings who have harbored evil feelings here on Earth,
must undergo their hard experiences in the sight of those who
developed and harbored good feelings.
It
can indeed be said: All that remains concealed to begin with in
the inner being of man, discloses itself when he has passed
through the gate of death. Sleep too acquires a cosmic
significance, likewise our life during wintertime. We sleep
every night in order that we may prepare for ourselves the
light in which we must live after death. We go through our
winter experiences in order to prepare the soul-spiritual
warmth into which we enter after death. And into this
atmosphere of the spiritual world which we have ourselves
prepared we bear the effects of our deeds.
Here on Earth we live, through our physical body, as beings
subject to earthly gravity. Through our breathing we live in
the surrounding air, and far away we see the stars. When we
have passed through the gate of death we are in the world of
spirit-and-soul, far removed from the Earth; we are beyond the
stars, we see the stars from the other side, look back to the
world of stars. Our very being lives in the cosmic thoughts and
cosmic forces. We look back upon the stars, no longer seeing
them shine, but seeing instead the Hierarchies, the Spiritual
Beings who have merely their reflection in the stars.
Thus man on Earth can gain more and more knowledge of what the
nature of his life will be when he passes through the gate of
death. There are people who say: ‘Why do I need to know all
this? I shall surely see it all after death!’ — That
attitude is just as if a man were to doubt the value of
eyesight. For as the Earth's evolution takes its course, man
enters more and more into a life in which he must acquire the
power to partake in these after-death experiences by grasping
them, to begin with in thought, here on the Earth. To shut out
knowledge of the spiritual worlds while we are on the Earth is
to blind ourselves in soul and spirit after death. A man will
enter the spiritual world as a cripple when he passes through
the gate of death, if here, in this world, he disdains to learn
about the world of spirit, for humanity is evolving towards
freedom — towards free spiritual activity. This fact
should become clearer and clearer to mankind and should make
men realize the urgent necessity of gaining knowledge about the
spiritual world.
|