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Rudolf Steiner e.Lib
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Universe, Earth and Man
Rudolf Steiner e.Lib Document
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Universe, Earth and Man
The reversing of Egyptian remembrance into material forms by way of Arabism. The harmonizing of Egyptian remembrance. The Christian impulse of power in Rosicrucianism.
Schmidt Number: S-1817
On-line since: 11th July, 2002
The reversing of Egyptian remembrance into material forms by way of Arabism. The harmonizing of Egyptian remembrance. The Christian impulse of power in Rosicrucianism.
In the previous lectures wide reaches, both of human evolution and
also of world evolution, were brought before our souls. We saw how
mysterious connections in the evolution of the world are reflected in
the civilizations of the different nations belonging to the
post-Atlantean period. We saw how the first epoch of earthly
development is reflected in the civilization of ancient India; the
second, during which the separation of the sun from the earth took
place, is reflected in the Persian civilization; and we have
endeavoured, as far as time permitted, to sketch the various events of
the Lemurian epoch the third in the course of the earth's
development in which man received the foundations of his ego,
which is reflected in the civilization of Egypt. It was pointed out
that the initiation wisdom of ancient Egypt was a kind of remembrance
of this, which was the first period of earthly evolution in which man
participated. Then, coming to the fourth age, that in which the true
union between body and spirit is so beautifully presented in the art
of Greece, we showed it to be a reflection of what man experienced
with the ancient gods, the beings we have described as Angels. Nothing
remained that could be reflected in our age the fifth
the age now running its course. Secret connections do, however, exist
between the different periods of post Atlantean civilization; these we
have already touched on in the first of these lectures.
You may recall how it was stated that the confinement of the people of
the present day to their own immediate surroundings, that is, to the
materialistic belief that reality is only to be found between life and
death, can be traced to the circumstance of the Egyptians having
bestowed so much care on the preservation of the bodies of the dead.
They tried at that time to preserve the physical form of man, and this
has not been without an effect on souls after death. When the bodily
form is thus preserved the soul after death is still connected in a
certain way with the form it bore during life. Thought-forms are
called up in the soul, these cling to the sensible form, and when the
person incarnates again and again and the soul enters into new bodies
these thought-forms endure.
All that the human soul experienced when it looked down from spiritual
heights upon its corpse is firmly rooted within it, hence it has not
been able to unlearn this, nor to turn away from the vision which
bound it to the flesh. The result has been that countless souls who
were incorporated in ancient Egypt are born again with the fruits of
this vision, and can only believe in the reality of the physical body.
This was firmly implanted in souls at that time. Things that take
place in one age of culture are by no means unconnected with the ages
that follow.
Suppose that we represent here the seven consecutive cultural periods
of post-Atlantean civilization by a line. The fourth age, which is
exactly in the middle, occupies an exceptional position.
We have only to consider this age exoterically to see that in it the
most wonderful physical things have been produced, things by which man
has conquered the physical world in a unique and harmonious way.
Looking back to the Egyptian pyramids we observe a type of geometric
form which demonstrates certain things symbolically. The close union
of spirit the formative human spirit and the physical
form had not yet been completed. We see this with special clearness in
the Sphinx, the origin of which is to be traced to a remembrance of
the Atlantean etheric human form. In its physical form the Sphinx
gives us no direct conviction of this union, although it is a great
human conception; in it we see the thought embodied that man is still
animal-like below and only attains to what is human in the etheric
head.
What confronts us on the physical plane is ennobled in the fourth age
in the forms of Greek plastic art; and the moral life, the destiny of
man, we find depicted in the Greek tragedies. In them we see the inner
life of the spirit played out upon the physical plane in a very
wonderful way; we see the meaning of earthly evolution in so far as
the gods are connected with it.
So long as the earth was a part of the sun, high Sun-Spirits were
united with the human race. By the end of the Atlantean epoch these
exalted Beings had gradually faded, step by step, along with the sun,
from the consciousness of man. Human consciousness was no longer
capable of reaching up after death to the high realms where vision of
the Sun-Spirits was possible. Assuming that we are at the standpoint
of these Beings (which we can be in spirit), we can picture them
saying: We were once united with humanity but had to withdraw from
them for a time. The divine world had to disappear from human
consciousness so as to re-appear in a newer, higher form through the
Christ-Impulse.
A man who belonged to Grecian civilization was incapable as yet of
understanding what was to come to earth through the Christ; but an
Initiate, one who, as we have seen, knew the Christ aforetime, could
say: That spiritual form which was preserved in men's minds as Osiris
had to disappear for a time from the sight of man, the horizon of the
Gods had to be darkened, but within us dwells the sure consciousness
that the glory of God will appear again on earth. This certainty was
the result of the cosmic consciousness which men possessed and the
consciousness of the withdrawal of the glory of God and of its return
is reflected in Greek tragedy.
We see man here represented as the image of the Gods, we see how he
lives, strives, and has a tragic end. At the same time the tragedy
holds within it the idea that man will yet conquer through his
spiritual power. The drama was intended as a presentation of living
and dying humanity, and at the same time it reflected man's whole
relationship to the universe. In every realm of Greek culture we see
this union between things of the spirit and things of the senses. It
was a unique age in post-Atlantean civilization.
It is remarkable how certain phenomena of the third age are connected
as by underground channels with our own, the fifth age. Certain things
which were sown as seed during the Egyptian age are re-appearing in
our own; others which were sown as seed during the Persian age will
appear in the sixth; and things belonging to the first epoch will
return in the seventh. Everything has a deep and law-filled
connection, the past pointing always to the future. This connection
will best be realized if we explain it by referring to the two
extremes, those things connecting the first and the seventh age. Let
us turn back to the first age and consider, not what history tells us,
but what really existed in ancient pre-Vedic times.
Everything that appeared later had been first prepared for; this was
especially the case with the division of mankind into castes.
Europeans may feel strong objections to the caste system, but it was
justified in the civilization of that time, and is profoundly
connected with human karma. The souls coming over from Atlantis were
really of very different values, and in some respects it was suitable
for these souls, of whom some were at a more advanced stage than
others, to be divided in accordance with the karma they had previously
stored up for themselves. In that far off age humanity was not left to
itself as it is now, but was really led and guided in its development
in a much higher way than is generally supposed. At that time highly
advanced individuals, whom we call the Rishis, understood the value of
souls, and the difference there is between the various categories of
souls. At the bottom of the division into castes lies a well-founded
cosmic law. Though to a later age this may seem harsh, in that far-off
time, when the guidance of humanity was spiritual, the caste principle
was entirely suited to human nature.
It is true that in the normal evolution of man those who lived over
into a new age with a particular karma came also into a particular
caste, and it is also true that a man could only rise above any
special caste if he underwent a process of initiation. Only when he
attained a stage where he was able to strip off that which was the
cause of his karma, only when he lived in Yoga, could the difference
in caste, under certain circumstances, be overcome. Let us keep in
mind the Anthroposophical principle which lays down that we must put
aside all criticism of the facts of evolution and strive only to
understand them. However had the impression this division into castes
makes on us at the present time, there was every justification for it,
and it has to be taken in connection with a far-reaching and just
arrangement regarding the human race.
When a person speaks of races today he speaks of something that is no
longer quite correct; even in Theosophical handbooks great mistakes
are made on this subject. In them it is said that our evolution runs
its course in Rounds, that in each Round there are Globes, and in each
Globe, Races which develop one after the other so that we have
races in each epoch of the earth's evolution.
But this is not the case. Even in regard to present humanity there is
no justification for speaking of a mere development of races. In the
true sense of the word we can only speak of race development during
the Atlantean epoch. People were so different in external physiognomy
throughout the seven periods that one might speak rather of different
forms than races. While it is true that the races have arisen through
this, it is [in]correct to speak of races in the far back Lemurian epoch;
and in our own epoch the idea of race will gradually disappear along
with all the differences that are a relic of earlier times. We still
speak of races, but all that remains of these today are relics of
differences that existed in Atlantean times, and the idea of race has
now lost its original meaning. What new idea is to arise in place of
the present idea of race?
[The translator of this edition used the word
“correct” when referring to races in the Lemurian epoch.
An examination of the original German shows the word to use should
be “incorrect.” The bracketed word above reflects this.
– e.Editor]
Humanity will be differentiated in the future even more than in the
past; it will be divided into categories, but not in an arbitrary way;
from their own spiritual inner capacities men will come to know that
they must work together for the whole body corporate.
There will be categories and classes however fiercely class-war may
rage today, among those who do not develop egoism but accept the
spiritual life and evolve toward what is good a time will come when
men will organize themselves voluntarily. They will say: One must do
this, the other must do that. Division of work even to the smallest
detail will take place; work will be so organized that a holder of
this or that position will not find it necessary to impose his
authority on others. All authority will be voluntarily recognized, so
that in a small portion of humanity we shall again have divisions in
the seventh age, which will recall the principle of castes, but in
such a way that no one will feel forced into any caste, but each will
say: I must undertake a part of the work of humanity, and leave
another part to another both will be equally recognized.
Humanity will be divided according to differences in intellect and
morals; on this basis a spiritualized caste system will again appear.
Led, as it were, through a secret channel, the seventh age will repeat
that which arose prophetically in the first. The third, the Egyptian
age, is connected in the same way with our own. Little as it may
appear to a superficial view, all that was laid down during the
Egyptian age re-appears in the present one. Most of the people living
on the earth today were incarnated formerly in Egyptian bodies and
experienced an Egyptian environment; having lived through other
intermediate incarnations, they are now again on earth, and, in
accordance with the laws we have indicated, they unconsciously
remember what they experienced in Egypt.
All this is re-appearing now in a mysterious way, and if you are
willing to recognize such secret connection of the great laws of the
universe working from one civilization to another, you must make
yourselves acquainted with the truth, not with all those legendary and
fantastic ideas which are given out concerning the facts of human
evolution.
People think too superficially about the spiritual progress of
humanity. For example, someone remarks about Copernicus that a man
with such ideas as his was possible, because in the age in which he
lived a change in thought had arisen regarding the solar system.
Anyone holding such an opinion has never studied, even exoterically,
how Copernicus arrived at his ideas concerning the relationship of the
heavenly bodies. One who has done this, and who more especially has
followed the grand ideas of Kepler, knows differently, and he will be
strengthened even more in these ideas by what occultism has to say
about it.
Let us consider this so that we may see the matter clearly, and try to
enter into the soul of Copernicus. This soul had lived in the age of
ancient Egypt, and had then occupied an important position in the cult
of Osiris; it knew that Osiris was held to be the same as the high
Sun-Being.
The sun, in a spiritual sense, was at the centre of Egyptian thought
and feeling; I do not mean the outwardly visible sun; it was regarded
only as the bodily expression of the spiritual sun. Just as the eye is
the expression for the power of sight, so to the Egyptian the Sun was
the eye of Osiris, the embodiment of the Spirit of the Sun. All this
had been experienced at one time by the soul of Copernicus, and it was
the unconscious memory of it that impelled him to renew, in a form
possible to a materialistic age, this ancient idea of Osiris, which at
that time had been entirely spiritual. When humanity had sunk more
deeply within the physical plane, this idea confronts us again in its
materialistic form, as the Copernican theory.
The Egyptians possessed the spiritual conception and it was the
world-karma of Copernicus to retain a memory of such conceptions, and
this conjured forth that combination of bearings that led
to his theory of the solar system. The case was similar with Kepler,
who, in his three laws, presented the movement of the planets round
the sun in a much more comprehensive way; however abstract they may
appear to us, they were the result of a most profound conception. A
striking fact in connection with this highly gifted being is contained
in a passage written by himself and which fills us with awe when we
read it. Kepler writes: I have thought deeply upon the Solar
System. It has revealed to me its secrets; I will carry over the
sacred ceremonial vessels of the Egyptians into the modern
world.
Thoughts implanted in the souls of the ancient Egyptians meet us
again, and our modern truths are the re-born myths of Egypt. Were it
desired, we could follow this up in many details; we could follow it
up to the very beginnings of humanity. Let us think once more of the
Sphinx, that wondrous, enigmatic form which later became the Sphinx of
Oedipus, who put its well-known riddle to man. We have learnt already
that the Sphinx is built up from that human form which on the physical
plane still resembled that of animals, although the etheric part had
already assumed human form. In the Egyptian age man could only see the
Sphinx in an etheric form after he had passed through certain stages
of initiation. Then it appeared to him. But the important thing is
that when a man had true clairvoyant perception it did not appear to
him merely as a lump of wood does, but certain feelings were
necessarily associated with the vision.
Under certain circumstances a callous person may pass by a highly
important work of art and remain unmoved by it; clairvoyant
consciousness is not like this; when really developed the fitting
emotion is already aroused. The Greek legend of the Sphinx expresses
the right feeling, experienced by the clairvoyant during the ancient
Egyptian period and also in the Grecian Mysteries, when he had
progressed so far that the Sphinx appeared to him. What was it that
then appeared before his eyes? He beheld something incomplete
something that was in course of development. The form he saw was in a
certain way related to that of animals, and in the etheric head we saw
what was to work within the physical form in order to shape it more
like man. What man was to become, what his task was in evolution, this
was the question that rose vividly before him when he saw the Sphinx
a question full of longing, of expectation, and of future
development.
The Greeks say that all investigation and philosophy have originated
from longing; this is also a saying of clairvoyants. A form appears to
man which he can only perceive with his astral consciousness; it
worries him, it propounds a riddle, the riddle of man's future.
Further, this etheric form, which was present in the Atlantean epoch
and lived on as a memory into the Egyptian age, is embodied more and
more in man, and re-appears on the other side in the nature of man. It
reappears in all the religious doubts, in the impotence of our age of
civilization when faced with the question: What is man? In all
unanswered questions, in all statements that revolve round
Ignorabimus, we have to see the Sphinx. In ages that were
still spiritual man could rise to heights where the Sphinx was
actually before him today it dwells within him in countless
unanswered questions.
It is therefore very difficult for man at the present time to arrive
at conviction with regard to the spiritual world. The Sphinx, which
formerly was outside him, is now in his inner being, for a Being has
appeared in the central epoch of post-Atlantean evolution Who has cast
the Sphinx into the abyss into the individual inner being of
every man.
When the Greco-Latin age, with its after-effects, had continued into
the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries we come to the fifth
post-Atlantean age. Up to the present new doubts have arisen more and
more in place of the old certainty. We meet with such things more and
more, and if desired we could discover many more instances of Egyptian
ideas, transformed into their materialistic counterpart in the new
evolution. We might ask what has really happened in the present age,
for this is no ordinary passing over of ideas; things are not met with
directly, but they are as if modified. Everything is presented in a
more materialistic form; even man's connection with animal nature
re-appears, but changed into a materialistic conception. The fact that
man knew in earlier times that he could not shape his body otherwise
than in the semblance of animals, and that on this account in his
Egyptian remembrances he pictured even his gods in animal forms,
confronts us today in the generally held materialistic opinion that
man has descended from animals. Darwinism is nothing but an heirloom
of ancient Egypt in a materialistic form.
From this we see that the path of evolution has by no means been a
straightforward one, but that something like a division has taken
place, one branch becoming more materialistic and one more spiritual.
That which had formerly progressed in one line now split into two
lines of development, namely, science and belief.
Going back into earlier times, to the Egyptian, Persian, and ancient
Indian civilizations, one does not find a science apart from faith.
What was known regarding the spiritual origin of the world passed in a
direct line to knowledge of particular things; men were able to rise
from knowledge of the material world to the most exalted heights;
there was no contradiction between knowledge and faith. An ancient
Indian sage or a Chaldean priest would not have understood this
difference; even the Egyptians knew no difference between what was
simply a matter of belief or a fact of knowledge. This difference
became apparent when man had sunk more deeply into matter, and had
gained more material culture; but in order to gain this another
organization was necessary.
Let us suppose that this descent of man into matter had not taken
place; what would have happened? We considered a like descent in the
last lecture, but it was of a different nature; this is a new descent
in another realm, by which something like an independent science
entered alongside the comprehension of what was spiritual. This
occurred first in Greece. Up till then opposition between science and
religion did not exist; and would have had no meaning to a priest of
Egypt. Take, for instance, what Pythagoras learnt from the Egyptians,
the teaching regarding numbers. This was not merely abstract
mathematics to him; it gave him the musical secrets of the world in
the harmony of numbers. Mathematics, which is only something abstract
to the man of the present day, was to him a sacred wisdom with a
religious foundation.
Man had, however, to sink more and more within the material, physical
plane, and it can be seen how the spiritual wisdom of Egypt reappears
but transformed into a materialistic, mythical conception of
the universe. In the future, the theories of today will be held to
have had only temporal value, just as ancient theories have only a
temporal value to the man of today. Perhaps men will then be so
sensible that they will not fall into the mistake of some of our
contemporaries who say: Until the nineteenth century man was
absolutely stupid as regards science; it was only then he became
sensible all that was taught previously about anatomy was nonsense,
only the last century has produced what is true. In the future
men will be wiser, and will not give tit for tat; they will not reject
our myths of anatomy, philosophy, and Darwinism so disdainfully as
present-day man rejects ancient truths. For it is the case that things
which today are regarded as firmly established are but transitory
forms of truth.
The Copernican system is but a transitory form, it has been brought
about through the plunge into materialism, and will be replaced by
something different. The forms of truth continually change. In order
that all connection with what is spiritual should not be lost, an even
stronger spiritual impulse had to enter human evolution. This was
described yesterday as the Christ-Impulse. For a time mankind had to
be left to itself, as it were, as regards scientific progress, and the
religious side had to develop separately; it had to be saved from the
progressive onslaught of science.
Thus we see how science, which devoted itself to material things, was
separated for a while from things spiritual, which now followed a
special course and the two movements belief in what was
spiritual, and the knowledge of external things proceeded side
by side. We even see in one particular period of development in the
Middle Ages, a period immediately preceding our own, that science and
belief consciously oppose each other, but still seek union.
Consider the Scholastics. They said: Faith was given to man by Christ,
this we may not deny; it was a direct gift; and all the science which
has been produced since the division took place, can only serve to
prove this gift. We see in scholasticism the tendency to employ all
science to prove revealed truth. At its prime it said: Men can gaze
upwards to the blessedness of faith and to a certain degree human
science can enter into it, but to do this men must devote themselves
to it.
In the course of time all relationship between science and belief was,
however, lost, and there was no longer any hope that they could
advance side by side. The extremity of this divergence is found in the
philosophy of Kant, where science and belief are completely sundered.
In it, on the one hand, the categorical imperative is put forward with
its practical postulates of reason; on the other hand, purely
theoretical reason which has lost all connection with spiritual truths
and declares that from the standpoint of science these cannot be
found.
Another powerful impulse was, however, already making itself felt,
which also represented a memory of ancient Egyptian thought. Minds
appeared that were seeking a union between science and belief, minds
that were endeavouring, through entering profoundly into science, to
recognize the things of God with such certainty and clarity that they
would be accessible to scientific thought. Goethe is typical of such a
thinker and of such a point of view. To him religion, art, and science
were one; he felt the works of Greek art to be connected with
religion, as he felt the great thoughts of Divinity to be reflected in
the countless plant formations he investigated.
Taking the whole of modern culture, we have to see in it a memory of
Egyptian culture; Egyptian thought is reflected in it from its
beginning.
The division in modern culture between science and belief did not
arise without long preparation, and if we are to understand how
this came about we must glance briefly at the way
post-Atlantean culture was prepared for during the Atlantean epoch.
We have seen how a handful of people who dwelt in the neighbourhood of
Ireland had progressed the furthest; they had acquired those qualities
which had to appear gradually in the succeeding epochs of
civilization. The rudiments of the ego had been developing as we know
since the Lemurian epoch, but each stage of selfhood in this small
group of people, by whom the stream of culture was carried from West
to East, consisted in a tendency to logical thought and the power of
judgment. Up to this time these did not exist; if a thought arose it
was already substantiated. The beginning of thought that was capable
of judgment was implanted in these people, and they bore the rudiments
of this with them from West to East in their colonizing migrations,
one of which went southwards towards India. Here the first foundations
of constructive thinking were laid. Later, this constructive thinking
passed into the Persian civilization. In the third cultural period,
that of Chaldea, it grew stronger and with the Greeks it developed so
far that they have left behind them the glorious monument of
Aristotelian philosophy.
Constructive thought continued to develop more and more, but always
returned to a central point, where it received reinforcement. We must
picture it as follows: When civilization came from the West into Asia
one group, that having the smallest amount of purely logical thinking
capacity, went toward India; the second group, which traveled towards
Persia, had a little more; and the group that went towards Egypt had
still more. From within this group were separated off the people of
the Old Testament, who had exactly that combination of faculties which
had to be developed in order that another forward step might be taken
in this purely logical form of human cognition.
With this is associated the other thing we have been considering,
namely, the descent to the physical plane. The further we descend the
more does thought become merely logical, and the more it tends to a
merely external faculty of judgment. Pure logical thought, mere human
logic, that which proceeds from one idea to another, requires the
human brain as its instrument; the cultivated brain makes logical
thought possible. Hence external thinking, even when it has reached an
astonishing height, can never of itself comprehend reincarnation,
because it is in the first place only applicable to the things of the
external sense world that surrounds us.
Logic may indeed be applied to all worlds, but can only be applied
directly to the physical world; hence when it appears as human logic
it is bound unconditionally to its instrument, the physical brain.
Abstract thought could never have entered the world without a further
descent into the world of the senses. This development of logical
thought is bound up with the loss of ancient clairvoyant vision, and
was bought at the cost of this loss. The task of man is to re-conquer
clairvoyant vision, adding logical thought to it. In time to come he
will obtain imagination as well, but logical thinking will be
retained.
The human head had in the first place to be created similar to the
etheric head before man could have a brain. It was then first possible
for man to descend to the physical plane. In order that all
spirituality should not be lost a point of time had to be chosen for
the saving of this, when the last impulse to purely mechanical thought
had not yet been given. If the Christ had appeared a few centuries
later He would have come, as it were, too late, for humanity would
have descended too far, would have been too much entangled in thought,
and would not have been able to understand Christ. Christ had to come
before this last impulse had been received, when the spiritually
religious tendency could still be saved as a tendency leading to
belief. Then came the last impulse, which plunged human thought to the
lowest point, where it was banished and completely chained to physical
life. This arose through the Arabs and Mohammedans. Moslem thought is
a peculiar episode in Arabian life and thought, which in its passage
over to Europe gave the final impulse to logical thinking to
that which is incapable of rising to what is spiritual.
To begin with, man was so led by what may be called Providence or a
spiritual guidance that spiritual life was saved in Christendom;
later, Arabism approached Europe from the south and provided the field
for external culture. It is only capable of comprehending what is
external. Do we not see this in the Arabesque, which is incapable of
rising to what is living, but has to remain formal? We can also see in
the Mosque how the spirit is, as it were, sucked out.
Humanity had first to be led down into matter, then in a roundabout
way by means of Arabism, and the invasion of the Arab, we are shown
how modern science first arose in the sharp contact of Arabism with
Europeanism which had already accepted Christianity. The ancient
Egyptian memories had come to life again; but what made them
materialistic? What made them into thought-forms of the dead? We can
show this clearly. If the path of progress had been smooth the memory
of what had taken place previously would have re-appeared in our age.
That which is spiritual has been saved as a whole, but one wing of
European culture has been gripped by materialism. We also see how the
remembrance of those who recalled the ancient Egyptian age was so
changed by its passage through Arabism that it reappeared in a
materialistic form. The fact that Copernicus comprehended the modern
way of regarding the solar system was the outcome of his Egyptian
memory. The reason why he presented it in a materialistic form, making
of it a dead mechanical rotation, is because the Arabian mentality,
encountering this memory from the other side, forced it into
materialism.
From all that has been said you can see how secret channels connect
the third and the fifth age. This can be seen even in the principle of
initiation, and as modern life is to receive a principle of initiation
in Rosicrucianism let us ask what this is.
In modern science we have to see a union between Egyptian remembrances
and Arabism, which tends towards that which is dead. On the other side
we see another union consummated, that between what Egyptian initiates
imparted to their pupils and things spiritual. We see a union between
wisdom and that which had been rescued as the truths of belief. This
wondrous harmony between the Egyptian remembrance in wisdom and the
Christian impulse of power is found in Rosicrucian spiritual teaching.
So the ancient seed laid down in the Egyptian period re-appears, not
merely as a repetition, but differentiated and upon a higher level.
These are thoughts which should not only instruct with regard to the
universe, earth, and man, but they should enter as well into our
feeling and our impulses of will and give us wings; for they show us
the path we have to travel. They point the path to that which is
spiritual, and also show how we may carry over into the future what,
in a good sense, we have gained here on the purely material plane.
We have seen how paths separate and again unite; the time will come
when not the remembrances only of Egypt will unite with spiritual
truths to produce a Rosicrucian science, but science and
Rosicrucianism will also unite. Rosicrucianism is both a religion and
at the same time a science that is firmly bound to what is material.
When we turn to the Babylonian period we find this is shown in myth of
the third period of civilization; here we are told of the God Maradu,
who meets with the evil principle, the serpent of the Old Testament,
and splits his head in two, so that in a certain sense the earlier
adversary is divided into two parts. This was in fact what actually
happened; a partition of that which arose in the primeval, watery
earth-substance, as symbolized by the serpent. In the upper part we
have to see the truths upheld by faith, in the lower the purely
material acceptance of the world. These two must be united
science and that which is spiritual and they will be united in
the future. This will come to pass when, through Rosicrucian wisdom,
spirituality is intensified, and itself becomes a science, when it
once more coincides with the investigations made by science. Then a
mighty harmonious unity will again arise; the various currents of
civilization will unite and flow together through the channels of
humanity. Do we not see in recent times how this unity is being
striven for?
When we consider the ancient Egyptian mysteries we see that religion,
science, and art were then one. The course of the world evolution is
shown in the descent of the Gods into matter; this is presented to us
in a grand dramatic symbolism. Anyone who can appreciate this
symbolism has science before him, for he sees there vividly portrayed
the descent of man and his entrance into the world. He is also
confronted with something else, namely, art, for the picture presented
to him is an artistic reflection of science. But he does not see only
these two, science and art, in the mysteries of ancient Egypt; they
are for him at the same time religion, for what is presented to him
pictorially is filled with religious feeling.
These three were later divided; religion, science, and art went
separate ways, but already in our age men feel that they must again
come together.
What else was the great effort of Richard Wagner than a spiritual
striving, a mighty longing towards a cultural impulse? The Egyptians
saw visible pictures because the external eye had need of them. In our
age what they saw will be repeated; once more the separate streams of
culture will unite, a whole will be constructed, this time preferably
in a work of art whose elements will be the sequence of sound. On
every side we find connections between what appertained to Egypt and
modern times; everywhere this reflection can be seen. As time goes on
our souls will realize more and more that each age is not merely a
repetition but an ascent; that a progressive development is taking
place in humanity. Then the most intimate strivings of humanity
the striving for initiation must find fulfillment.
The principle of initiation suited to the first age cannot be the
principle of initiation for the changed humanity of today. It is of no
value to us to be told that the Egyptians had already found primeval
wisdom and truth in ancient times; that these are contained in the old
Oriental religions and philosophies, and that everything that has
appeared since exists only to enable us to experience the same over
again if we are to rise to the highest initiation. No! This is useless
talk. Each age has need of its own particular force within the depths
of the human soul.
When it is asserted in certain Theosophical quarters that there is a
western initiation for our stage of civilization, but that it is a
late product, that true initiation comes only from the East, we must
answer that this cannot be determined without knowing something
further. The matter must be gone into more deeply than is usually
done. There may be some who say that in Buddha the highest summit was
reached, that Christ has brought nothing new since Buddha; but only in
that which meets us positively can we recognize what really is
the question here. If we ask those who stand on the ground of Western
initiation whether they deny anything in Eastern initiation, whether
they make any different statements regarding Buddha than those in the
East, they answer, No. They value all; they agree with
all; but they understand progressive development. They can be
distinguished from those who deny the Western principle of initiation
by the fact that they know how to accept what Orientalism has to give,
and in addition they know the advanced forms which the course of time
has made necessary. They deny nothing in the realm of Eastern
initiation.
Take a description of Buddha by one who accepts the standpoint of
Western esotericism. This will not differ from that of a follower of
Eastern esotericism; but the man with the Western standpoint holds
that in Christ there is something which goes beyond Buddha. The
Eastern standpoint does not allow this. If it is said that Buddha is
greater than Christ that does not decide anything, for this depends on
something positive. Here the Western standpoint is the same as the
Eastern. The West does not deny what the East says, but it asserts
something further.
The life of Buddha is not rightly understood when we read that Buddha
perished through the enjoyment of too much pork; this must not be taken
literally. It is rightly objected from the standpoint of Christian
esotericism that people who understand something trivial from this
understand nothing about it at all; this is only an image, and shows
the position in which Buddha stood to his contemporaries. He had
imparted too many of' the sacred Brahmanical secrets to the outer
world. He was ruined through having given out that which was hidden,
as is everyone else who imparts what is hidden.
This is what is expressed in this peculiar symbol. Allow me to
emphasize strongly that we disagree in no way with Oriental
conceptions, but people must understand the esotericism of such
things. If it is said that this is of little importance: it is not the
case. They might as well think it of little importance when we are
told that the writer of the Apocalypse wrote it amid thunder and
lightning, and if anyone found occasion to mock at the Apocalypse
because of this we should reply: What a pity he does not know
what it means when we are told that the Apocalypse was imparted to the
earth 'mid lightning and thunder!
We must keep in mind the fact that no negation has passed the lips of
Western esotericists, and that much that was puzzling at the beginning
of the Anthroposophical movement has been explained by them. The
followers of Western esotericism never find in it anything out of
harmony with the mighty truths given to the world by H. P. Blavatsky.
When we are told, for example, that we have to distinguish in the
Buddha the Dhyani-Buddha, the Adi-Buddha, and the human Buddha, this
is first fully explained by the Western esotericist. For we know that
what is regarded as the Dhyani-Buddha is nothing but the etheric body
of the historic Buddha that had been taken possession of by a God;
that this etheric body had been laid hold of by the being whom we call
Wotan. This was already contained in Eastern esotericism, but was only
first understood in the right way through Western esotericism.
The Anthroposophical movement should be especially careful that the
feeling which rises in our souls from such thoughts as these should
stimulate in us the desire for further development, that we should not
stand still for a moment. The value of our movement does not consist
in the ancient dogmas it contains (if these are but fifteen years
old), but in comprehending its true purpose, which is the opening up
of fresh springs of spiritual knowledge. It will then become a living
movement and will help to bring about that future which, if only very
briefly, has been presented to your mental sight today, by drawing
upon what we are able to observe of the past.
We are not concerned with the imparting of theoretic truths, but that
our feeling, our perception, and our actions may be full of power.
We have considered the evolution of Universe, Earth, and Man; we
desire so to grasp what we have gathered from these studies that we
may be ready at any time to enter upon development.
What we call future must always be rooted in the past;
knowledge has no value if not changed into motive power for the
future. The purpose for the future must be in accordance with the
knowledge of the past, but this knowledge is of little value unless
changed into propelling force for the future.
What we have heard has presented to us a picture of' such mighty
motive powers that not only our will and our enthusiasm have been
stimulated, but our feelings of joy and of security in life have also
been deeply moved. When we note the interplay of so many currents we
are constrained to say: Many are the seeds within the womb of Time.
Through an ever deepening knowledge man must learn how better to
foster all these seeds. Knowledge in order to work, in order to gain
certainty in life, must be the feeling that pervades all
Anthroposophical study.
In conclusion I would like to point out that the so-called theories of
Spiritual Science only attain final truth when they are changed into
something living into impulses of feeling and of certainty as
regards life; so that our studies may not merely be theoretical, but
may play a real part in evolution.
Last Modified: 07-Oct-2024
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