|
|
|
Rudolf Steiner e.Lib
|
|
The Gospel of St. John
Rudolf Steiner e.Lib Document
|
|
The Gospel of St. John
The decline of the ancient wisdom and its renewal through the Christ-impulse. The significance of the Mystery of Golgotha for human evolution upon earth.
Schmidt Number: S-2041
On-line since: 10th September, 2002
We have now reached an important point, the climax, we might even say,
of our considerations. It goes without saying that we should have to
surmount all manner of difficulties in the course of our study and
explanation of the Gospels. Therefore, before continuing today, it
might be well for me to give a brief review of what was said yesterday
with regard to fundamental principles.
As we know, the development of mankind in ancient times was
essentially different in form from that of the present day; we also
know that the characteristics presented by man become increasingly
different the further we revert to ancient conditions. We have already
noticed that we can trace evolution backwards from our time (which we
may call the central European civilization) to the Graeco-Latin
period; thence to the Egypto-Chaldean period, and thence again to that
age in which the ancient Persian people were led by Zarathustra. We
then arrive at that remotely ancient Indian civilization, so very
different from our own a civilization which followed in point
of time upon a great cataclysm. This cataclysm, which ran its course
in storms and upheavals of the elements of air and water, led to the
disappearance of that continent inhabited by the human race before the
Indian civilization ancient Atlantis, situated between Europe,
Africa, and America. It also led to the migration of peoples westwards
and eastwards westwards to settle in America and eastwards in
the various countries of Europe, Asia, and Africa which had gradually
assumed their present form. The Atlantic period, especially in its
earlier portion, produced a humanity which, as regards the soul, was
totally different from that of the present day. But precisely the
conditions of soul are of greatest interest to us in the evolution of
mankind. Now of what nature was the life of the soul in the old
Atlantean period?
We know that man's consciousness at that time was totally different
from what it was later; he possessed a certain ancient gift of
clairvoyance, but not as yet the faculty of clear, distinct self- or
Ego-consciousness. For Ego-consciousness is only acquired when man
learns to distinguish himself from outer objects. Let us picture to
ourselves what would happen in our time if a man were not able, under
present conditions, to distinguish between himself and his
environment. In answer to the question: ‘What is the boundary of my
being?’ man is, from his present standpoint, to a certain extent
justified in saying: ‘My limit, as a human being, is where my skin
separates me from the world outside.’ Man believes that nothing
belongs to him save what is bounded by his skin; beyond this are
external objects which he sees before him and distinguishes from
himself. He knows that he no longer is and can be a whole human being,
if a part of that which is contained within his skin is removed. Now
to say that a man is no longer whole if a piece of his flesh is cut
off, is, from one point of view, correct. But at the same time we know
that man inhales air at every breath, and that this air is all around
us in our immediate environment; this is the very air which in the
next moment will be within us. Cut off the supply of this air and you
can no longer exist. You are less whole than you would be if the hand
within your skin were cut off. Strictly speaking, therefore, we must
admit that it is not true that we are bounded by our skin. The air
surrounding us is part of us, we breathe it in and out continually and
we have no right to make an arbitrary boundary of our skin. If people
would acquire some understanding of this truth (it would have to be
theoretical at first, not being provided by external perception), they
would be obliged to reflect upon things that are not borne in upon
them by the outer world itself. If it were possible for a man to watch
the current of air flowing into him, expanding in him, being
transformed in him and then leaving him, if he could see it at every
moment, he would never dream of saying that it was any less a part of
him than his own hand. he could reckon the air as belonging to himself
and would regard it as an hallucination to claim that he was an
independent being able to dispense with his environment. The Atlantean
was safeguarded against this illusion, for his observation clearly
showed him something different. He saw the objects of his environment
not in firm outlines but surrounded by a great coloured aura, as we
see the street lamps on a misty autumn evening. This was because there
is spirit between and among all things in the outer world; spiritual
beings whom the Atlantean could still perceive with the dull
clairvoyant faculty of those times. As the fog fills the interval
between the lamps, so too there are spiritual beings everywhere in
space. The Atlantean saw the spiritual beings as you see the fog; and
they formed themselves for him into something like a misty aura
enveloping external objects. The objects themselves were indistinct;
but since he saw the spirit, everything of a spiritual nature that
passed in and out of him was also perceptible to him. He therefore
also perceived himself to be a part of the entire world around him. He
saw on all sides currents which you cannot see today entering his
body. Air is but the densest of these; currents of a far subtler
nature flow into the human being. Man has lost the ability to behold
the spiritual because he no longer possesses the old gift of dim
clairvoyance. The man of Atlantis saw the spiritual currents streaming
in and out, as your finger, were it conscious, would see the blood
streaming in and out of it, and could know that it must perish if it
were cut off. Just as your finger would feel, so too the Atlantean
felt himself to be the member of an organism. He felt currents flowing
into him through eyes, ears, and so on, and he knew that if he were to
force himself out of their reach, he would cease to be a human being.
He felt as if he were poured out into the whole outer world. He saw
the spiritual world but could not distinguish himself as a being apart
from it, for he was without a strong Ego- or self-consciousness in the
present sense of the word. This consciousness was developed when
everything which revealed to him in a spiritual way his dependence on
the surrounding world receded from his observation. Inasmuch as the
spiritual became invisible to him, he found it possible to develop
self-consciousness or egoity, and this was precisely the task allotted
to post-Atlantean humanity. After the great Atlantean cataclysm, the
spiritual world receded from the consciousness of man, as he was then
constituted, and the physical world of sense became visible to him
with increasing clearness. But things do not come all at once in the
development of the world; they evolve slowly and by degrees. In the
earliest post-Atlantean times clairvoyance was an ordinary human
accomplishment; and whatever men beheld in the spiritual world was
continually perfected, amplified, and kept alive by the initiates who,
as we have seen, were led into the spiritual world by special methods
already described, and thus became the messengers of that which had
formerly been seen by all men more or less. Legends and myths,
especially those related to the oracle-sanctuaries, preserve for us
the truths of ancient times far better than any external historical
research. In these places certain persons were thrown into abnormal
states of consciousness a dream or mediumistic condition we
might now call it a condition which was below the level of
ordinary waking consciousness, and during which they indeed remained
within the objects of the outer world but did not see these. This was
not the original old clairvoyance but an intermediate state, half
dreamlike, half clairvoyant. When people wished to know something
concerning particular circumstances in the world; if they wished to
know how to act upon some occasion or other, they consulted the
oracle, where conditions of shadowy clairvoyance still existed as an
heritage of the old faculty.
Thus wisdom was bestowed upon man at the beginning of his evolution;
wisdom flowed into him. But the stream dried up by degrees; even the
initiates, in the abnormal state to which they were subjected (for
their etheric body was withdrawn when they were led into the spiritual
world), even they by degrees could only attain uncertain results in
their observation of the spiritual world. They, however, who had not
only partaken of the old initiation but had advanced with their age,
and were at the same time prophets of the future, recognized that a
new impulse was needed in humanity. An ancient wisdom had been
bestowed upon mankind when it descended from divine spiritual heights;
but the light of this wisdom had grown dimmer and dimmer. Formerly all
men had possessed it; then only a few, under special conditions in the
oracles; then only the initiates, and so on.
‘The day must come,’ so said the initiates who knew the signs of the
time, ‘when the old stock of wisdom will have lost its power to lead
and guide mankind. Humanity will then fall a prey to doubt and
uncertainty affecting the will, the actions, and the feelings of men.
And as wisdom gradually dies out, men will be led by their own folly;
their Ego will grow increasingly powerful, so that, when all wisdom
had withdrawn, each individual will begin to seek it in his own Ego,
to develop his own feelings and his will each for himself
and men will become ever more isolated, more estranged from
each other, and ever less capable of mutual understanding. Since each
individual would have nothing but his own thoughts, and these would
not come to him from universal wisdom, no individual will understand
the thoughts of his fellow; and since their feelings would not be
guided by universal wisdom, men will become involved in conflict, and
the same applies to their actions. Human beings will all act, think,
and feel in mutual opposition, and humanity will be finally cleft
asunder into a host of individuals at strife with each other.’
Now what was the outer sign expressing this phase of evolution? It was
the transformation which humanity experienced in the nature of its
blood. In early times, as we know, ‘near’ (consanguineous) marriage
was the rule. Marriage was contracted within the kindred stock. But in
time, the consanguineous tie was replaced to an increasing extent by
marriage with strangers. Foreign blood became mixed with foreign blood
and the heritage of ancient times became ever scantier. Let us once
more recall Goethe's words which we quoted yesterday:
‘From my father I have my stature and life's most earnest conduct;
From my mother a happy nature and delight in telling fables.’
We saw yesterday that these words were an allusion to the fact that
the content of man's etheric body is inherited from the maternal
element, as handed down from generation to generation. So that every
human being bears in his own etheric body the legacy of the maternal
element, while his physical body harbours the heritage of the paternal
element. So long as blood relationship was in force, the heritage
handed down from etheric body to etheric body was strongly effective,
and the old faculty of clairvoyance was bound up therewith. The
offspring of consanguineous marriage inherited in their etheric body
the old faculty of wisdom which was handed down to them with the
family blood. But when the blood became mixed through the
intermarriage of tribes foreign to each other, the possibility of
inheriting the ancient wisdom grew increasingly rare. For, as we said
yesterday, the blood of the race gradually altered, and its
intermingling obscured the ancient wisdom to an increasing extent. In
other words, the blood, the bearer of inherited maternal qualities,
became less and less able to bequeath the old gift of seership.
Through the evolution of their blood, men became less and less capable
of seeing into the spiritual world. Physically considered, therefore,
human blood underwent a change incapacitating it from being the bearer
of the old wisdom which had guided mankind so surely, and developed an
increasing tendency to fall into the other extreme and become the
bearer of egoism that is, of a quality which leads to isolation
and mutual opposition among men. Hence blood became less and less
capable of uniting human beings in love.
We are now of course still involved in this process of blood
deterioration, for, having begun in ancient times, it will slowly
pursue its course until the end of earth evolution. For this reason an
impulse was needed in humanity to repair the evil wrought by this
deterioration of the blood. Adherence to the principle of blood
relationship could not but lead men into error and misery, as the old
sages tell us in their myths and legends. Men could no longer rely
upon the remnants of inherited wisdom. ‘Even if thou dost consult the
oracle and ask what is to happen, the answer thou receivest will most
surely lead thee into the fiercest strife and conflict!’ The oracle
foretold, for instance, that Laios and Jocasta would have a son who
would kill his father and wed his mother. Nevertheless, in spite of
this heritage of ancient oracular wisdom, the blood tie could no
longer be prevented from falling a victim to error: Oedipus slays his
father and weds his mother; he commits parricide and incest (in spite
of the oracle).
The old sage meant: Men once possessed wisdom; but even had it
remained in their possession, the development of their Ego must
necessarily have proceeded apace; and egoism would attain such power
that blood would war against blood. With nothing but the old wisdom to
guide it, the blood element is no longer adequate to lead humanity to
a higher stage. Thus the clairvoyant initiate, to whom the original
image of the Oedipus legend is due, wished to hold up to mankind a
warning vision, saying: ‘Such would be your fate if nothing came save
the old wisdom of the oracles!’ In the Judas legend we find still more
clearly indicated what would have been the fate of this old oracular
wisdom. The mother of Judas was also prophetically warned that her son
would slay his father and wed his mother, whereby untold misery would
be brought to pass. And it all happened as foretold. That is to say,
the inherited ancient wisdom was incapable of guarding man from the
danger into which he could not but fall, were no new impulse to come
to mankind. Now let us enquire into the precise reason of this. Why
was the ancient wisdom condemned to become gradually useless as
regards its power over humanity? We shall find the answer to this
question if we examine closely into the origin of the ancient wisdom
in its relation to mankind.
I have already indicated that in early Atlantean times the connection
between the human physical and etheric bodies was of very different
nature than in later times. Considered today, the physical and etheric
bodies may be said roughly to coincide; this is especially the case
with the head portion. But this applies only to the present time. In
early Atlantean times we find the human etheric head largely extending
beyond its physical counterpart on all sides. The etheric body,
especially as regards the head, was far outside the physical body.
Atlantean evolution saw the gradual drawing in of the etheric body
until both finally coincided. Now so long as the etheric body was
outside the physical head, it was subject to very different conditions
from those of later times. It was connected on all sides with other
spiritual beings and with spiritual currents which, as they streamed
in and out, endowed the Atlantean etheric body with the faculty of
clairvoyance. This clairvoyance, therefore, was due to the incomplete
union of the etheric body with the physical head, whereby the head was
exposed on all sides to the action of spiritual forces which endowed
the etheric body with the faculty of clairvoyance. Then the time came
when the etheric body drew into the physical body. It tore itself away
from these forces, but not completely; it began to cut itself adrift
from the influences which had bestowed upon it the faculty of
clairvoyance and enabled it to behold the wisdom of the world. The
contrary effect was obtained by the old initiations; here the etheric
body was raised out of the physical, and the etheric head was once
more brought into touch with the action of the surrounding forces,
whereby clairvoyance again ensued. Now had this contact of the etheric
body with its spiritual environment been severed at one stroke in the
middle of the Atlantean period, the old clairvoyance would have
disappeared far more rapidly; there would have been no remnants of it
left over for the post-Atlantean period, and humanity would have
preserved no recollection, in later times, of its ancient
clairvoyance. As it happened, however, men did not lose every contact
with the external forces and currents, and something else too
occurred. Though it had wrested itself away from the action of its
spiritual environment, the etheric body nevertheless retained
something of its pristine wisdom a last remnant of what it
contained before it drew into the physical body a ‘small
saving’, if the expression may be used. It is as if a father earns
money and his son continually draws upon him according to his needs.
Man absorbed wisdom from his environment, as he needed it, until his
etheric body broke away from the higher worlds. Now, to keep to our
comparison, let us suppose that the son loses his father; only a part
of his father's fortune is left to him, and he earns nothing himself.
Thus a time must come when he will have exhausted this remnant and be
destitute. This was the position in which man found himself. He had
wrested himself from his Father-wisdom and, having added to it nothing
by his own work, subsisted on it up to the Christian era; and even in
our time he is still living on his inheritance and not on his own
earnings. He is living, as we might say, on his capital. In the
earliest period of post-Atlantean civilization, man still possessed a
part of his capital, without having acquired this wisdom for himself;
he was living on the interest and occasionally received an additional
allowance from the initiates. Finally, however, the coin of the
ancient wisdom lost its currency, and when Oedipus was paid in it, it
was no longer of any value. The old wisdom could guard neither him nor
Judas from the most terrible error.
This was the course followed by human evolution. Now how was it that
man gradually consumed his capital of wisdom? It was because at an
earlier time he had admitted into himself two kinds of spiritual
beings; first the ‘Luciferic’ beings, and then, in consequence of
these, the ‘Ahrimanic’ or Mephistophelian beings. These prevented him
from adding anything by his own labour to the store of ancient wisdom.
Their activity within human nature was such that the Luciferic beings
degraded man's passions and feelings, while the Ahrimanic beings
distorted his view of the world. Had the Luciferic beings not
intervened in the evolution of the earth, man would never have
acquired the excessive interest in the physical world which lowers him
below his status. Again, had the Ahrimanic or Satanic beings not
intervened (in consequence of the Luciferic beings), man would know
and would have known that there is a spiritual part behind every
object of sense. And he would see through the surface of the outer
sense world to the spiritual world beyond. But Ahriman has clouded his
perception with something like a dark veil of smoke, through which man
cannot pierce to the spiritual world. Through Ahriman man is enmeshed
in falsehood and entangled in a web of Maya or illusion. These two
classes of beings hinder man from adding to the old store of wisdom
that he once received; and so it dwindled away and became by degrees
entirely unfit for use.
Nevertheless, in certain other respects, evolution proceeded on its
course. In Atlantean times man descended into his physical body with
his etheric body. It was, so to speak, his fatal misfortune to become
‘God-forsaken’ and to experience the influences of Lucifer and Ahriman
in the physical world within the physical body. And it was precisely
the influence of the physical body and of life therein which rendered
the old store of wisdom unfit for use. How did this happen? In earlier
times man did not live in his physical body; he drew from the old
store of wisdom which belonged to his father; that is, the supply was
outside his physical body, because he lived with his etheric body
outside his physical body. This store was gradually exhausted. Man
should have had a store in his own body, if his supply of wisdom was
to be increased. But he had no such store, no source for the renewal
of his wisdom in his own body, and the consequence was that every time
he quitted his physical body at death, there was less wisdom in his
etheric body. The etheric body became poorer and poorer in respect of
wisdom after each incarnation. But evolution runs its course; and just
as the etheric body drew into the physical, in Atlantean times, the
development to which we are tending in the future will consist of the
gradual detachment of the etheric from the physical body. Whereas the
etheric body continually drew into the physical, until the coming of
Christ, the moment was then at hand in which the course of evolution
changed. The moment Christ appeared, the etheric body began to retrace
its course, and at the present day it is less firmly united with the
physical body than at the time of Christ's presence on Earth. The
physical body has become thereby still coarser.
The future will see man's etheric body loosened to an increasing
extent from the physical, and a stage will gradually be attained at
which the etheric body will be as far outside the physical as in
Atlantean times. We will pursue our comparison a little further.
If the son who lived from his father's bounty spends everything and
earns nothing himself, his prospects will be increasingly gloomy. But
if in his turn he has a son, the latter will not be in the same
position as his father. His father had at least inherited something
and could at any rate continue to spend it. But the grandson has
nothing left him; he inherits nothing and is destitute. This was more
or less the course of human evolution. When the etheric body entered
the physical, taking with it a supply of divine wisdom from the store
of the Gods, it brought wisdom into its physical body. But the
Luciferic and Ahrimanic beings prevented this wisdom being increased
and supplemented in the physical body. When the etheric body now again
detaches itself from the physical, it takes nothing with it from the
latter; and were nothing else to occur, the consequence would be that
man would enter upon a future state in which his etheric body would
indeed belong to him, but would contain no vestige of wisdom, no
vestige of knowledge. And whereas the physical body would dry up
completely, the etheric body would also be destitute, because it could
derive nothing from the physical in its withered state. If, therefore,
the physical body is to be guarded from becoming withered in that
future state, strength must be imparted to the etheric body the
strength of wisdom. As it is about to detach itself from the physical
body, and while it is still in the latter, the etheric body must
receive the power of wisdom. While still in the physical body it must
receive something to carry away with it. And when it is outside,
having received this wisdom, it reacts upon the physical body, brings
life to it and prevents it drying up.
There are two possibilities for the future evolution of mankind. One
of these is as follows:
Man might evolve without Christ. In this case his etheric body would
derive nothing from the physical and would leave the latter in an
empty state; moreover, being itself destitute, it could not vivify the
physical body and prevent it from crumbling away and drying up. Man
would gradually lose all the fruits of his physical life; his physical
body having become sterile he would be obliged to abandon it. But man
comes to earth precisely in order to receive a physical body. The germ
of the latter was given in earlier times, and without the finished
form of his physical body man would never fulfil his mission upon
earth. Now the influences of Lucifer and Ahriman have appeared on
earth. If man acquires nothing while in his physical body; if the
etheric body, having exhausted the ancient store of wisdom, takes
nothing new with it upon leaving the physical body, then the mission
of the Earth is doomed; it is lost to the universe. Man would bring
nothing with him into the future nothing but the empty etheric
skull which he brought replete into earthly evolution.
But now let us suppose that some event happened at the right moment,
thanks to which, man was enabled to permeate his etheric body with
wisdom, enlivening it as it quits the physical body. The etheric body
would still detach itself in the future, but now, endowed with new
life and vigour, it could apply these forces to the fortifying of the
physical body. But it first must needs receive and possess this
strength. Then, the etheric body having itself first received strength
and life, the fruits of human earthly existence are saved. Then the
physical body does not merely decay, but, though itself corruptible,
it assumes the form of the etheric body, the incorruptible. And the
resurrection of man, with the harvest reaped in the physical body, is
assured.
An impulse, therefore, was necessary to earth whereby the dwindling
treasure of ancient wisdom might be replenished and new life be
instilled into the etheric body, so that the physical body, itself
doomed to corruption, might put on incorruption and fill itself with
an etheric body which renders it incorruptible and carries it safely
out of earthly evolution. This very life, permeating the etheric body
it was Christ who brought it! To Christ therefore we owe it
that the physical body, otherwise dedicated to death, is transformed
and preserved from corruption, receiving the power to put on the
incorruptible. Life, fresh life, was poured into the human etheric
body by the Christ-impulse, the old life having been consumed. And
looking into the future, man must say: ‘When one day my etheric body
will be outside the physical, my development must have been such that
my etheric body is entirely filled with Christ. Christ must live in
me. In the course of my earthly evolution I must by degrees wholly
permeate my etheric body with Christ!’
What I have just described to you are the deeper processes which elude
external observation, the spiritual processes behind the physical
evolution of the world. But what must the external form have been?
What was it that entered the physical body with the Luciferic and
Ahrimanic beings? There entered the tendency to decay, to dissolution,
in other words, the tendency to death. The germ of death entered the
physical body. Had not Christ descended to earth, this death-germ would
have developed its full power at the end of the earthly evolution. For
then the etheric body would be powerless for all time to reanimate the
human being; and earthly evolution having reached its end, everything
in the nature of a physical body would fall a prey to corruption, and
the very mission of the Earth would be overtaken by death. When we
consider death today, our present life is at every moment a token of
that universal death which would ensue at the end of earthly
evolution. The endowment once bestowed upon mankind dwindles slowly
and by degrees. Nothing but this fund of life bestowed upon man makes
it possible for him to be reborn again and again, and to pass from
incarnation to incarnation. The possibility of life externally
considered in the succession of incarnations would not come to an end
until the end of earthly evolution. But in the course of time it would
become apparent that the human race was dying out. Member after member
would be affected and the physical body would shrivel up. Had the
Christ-impulse not been given, the human being would perish limb by
limb as earthly evolution drew to its close. Now the Christ-impulse is
only at the beginning of its development; it makes its way among men
slowly and by degrees, and it will be left to future generations to
show the full significance of Christ for humanity, on to the end of
earthly evolution.
But the various human institutions and interests have not been equally
affected by the Christ-impulse; there are many things in our day which
have been left quite unmoved by it and must wait for a future time. A
striking example will show how in our own day a whole region of human
activity has been left quite untouched by the Christ-impulse.
About the sixth or seventh century before Christ, as the pre-Christian
era was drawing to its close, the ancient wisdom and the ancient
power, as they affected human knowledge, began to wane. In respect of
other manifestations of life, the ancient wisdom long retained its
youthful freshness and vigour, but in all that affected knowledge it
was on the decline. From the eighth century before the Christian era
and onward, there remained what might be called the remnant of a
remnant. Had we retraced our steps to the days of Egypto-Chaldean,
ancient Persian, or Indian wisdom, we should have found it everywhere
imbued with true spiritual perceptions and the fruits of ancient
seership. For those who were not themselves highly clairvoyant, there
were the teachings of the seers. A ‘science’ not founded upon
clairvoyance did not exist and never had existed, either in Indian or
Persian times, or later. In the earliest Greek times, too, there was
no science without underlying clairvoyant research. Then, however, the
time approached when clairvoyant research came to an end, as far as
human science was concerned. Then we see the rise of a new human
science which is devoid of clairvoyance, or, at least, from which
clairvoyance is cast out step by step.
Seership dwindles away; so too the belief in the communications of the
seers; and a human science is founded, in the sixth and seventh
centuries before the coming of Christ, from which the results of
spiritual investigation are increasingly excluded. And so it goes on.
With Parmenides, Herakleitos, Plato, and even Aristotle, in the
writings of the old naturalists and physicians, it can be shown at
every turn what we know as science was originally saturated with the
results of spiritual investigation. But spiritual science dwindled
away and became ever scantier. As far as the faculties of the soul are
concerned, it still exists; as regards feeling and willing, it is
still there, but in the region of human thought it was exhausted by
degrees. Thus with regard to human scientific thought, the influence
of the etheric over the physical body had begun to dwindle at the time
of the coming of Christ. Everything proceeds by slow degrees. Then
Christ came and gave the impulse; but of course this impulse was not
received at once by all men; it was accepted in certain quarters and
rejected in others; in the domain of science it was clearly
repudiated. Take the science of the Roman Empire. See what Celsus, for
instance, says. You will find all kinds of trivialities in his works
regarding the Christ. Celsus was a great scholar but he had no
understanding for the Christ-impulse in its effect upon human thought.
Thus he relates that ‘a couple named Joseph and Mary are said to have
once lived in Palestine; these were the originators of the sect called
the Christians. But everything related of them is nothing but
superstition. The truth is that the wife of this Joseph betrayed her
husband with a Roman captain named Pintera. Joseph did not know who
was the father of the child.’
This was one of the accounts most widespread at that time. Anyone who
follows our contemporary literature will know that certain individuals
of the present day have not advanced beyond the standard of Celsus. It
is true that the Christ-impulse gains ground in some departments of
life, though slowly; but in the particular domain of which we are now
speaking, it has made no impression hitherto. Here we see one part of
the human being, to wit, something in the human brain, that is
perishing; whereas science would experience a revival in a quite
different form, if the brain were influenced by the Christ-impulse.
Strange as this may sound in our time of scientific fanaticism, it is
nevertheless true. That part of the human brain which is the chosen
instrument of scientific thought is doomed to a lingering death. Here
we see how the old heritage slowly and by degrees disappeared from
scientific thought. We see that Aristotle still possessed a relatively
large share; but in the course of time science is drained of its
ancient heritage and, though enriched by its later acquisitions in the
field of outer experience, it finally becomes God-forsaken as regards
thought, and has nothing left of the old treasure. Indeed, we see that
it is possible even for those who strongly experience Christ, to fail
to find a connection between the Christ-impulse and man's conquests in
the domain of science. There are visible proofs of this. Imagine a man
in the thirteenth century intensely penetrated by the Christ-impulse,
and that this man had said: ‘We have the Christ-impulse. It comes to
us from the Gospel like a flood of mighty new revelations, and we can
penetrate ourselves with it!’ Let us assume that this individual has
singled out for himself the task of creating a connecting link between
science and Christianity. Even in the thirteenth century he would have
found nothing suitable for his purpose in contemporary science. He
would have been obliged to revert to Aristotle, and with Aristotle
alone, not with the science of the thirteenth century, he could have
interpreted Christianity. For science was becoming less and less
capable of union with the Christ-principle. For this reason the men of
the thirteenth century were obliged to revert to Aristotle; he still
possessed some of the ancient heritage of wisdom and could furnish the
concepts by which science and Christianity could be reconciled.
Science then became poorer and poorer in ideas precisely inasmuch as
it became richer in observations. Finally the time came when all the
conception of ancient wisdom vanished from science. The greatest of
men are of course children of their age with regard to their science.
Galileo himself could not derive his thought from the Absolute; he
could only think the thought of his age. And his greatness is due
precisely to the fact that he establishes purely ‘God-forsaken’
thought, purely mechanical thought. With Galileo a great revolution in
thought takes place. The most ordinary phenomenon of physics was
explained differently before and after Galileo. A stone is thrown.
Today we are told that the stone continues its motion until the latter
is arrested by the influence of another force, the power of inertia.
Before Galileo, people thought entirely differently; they were
convinced that if the stone continues its course, it must be impelled
by someone; something active was behind the flying stone. Galileo
revolutionized human thought and taught men to view the world as a
mechanism. Today it is in every sense an ideal to explain the world
from the mechanical standpoint, as a mechanism, from which all spirit
is eliminated. This is due to the fact that those portions of the
human brain which are the instrument and organ of scientific thought
are today so deadened that they are unable to convey new life to the
conceptions they form, and the latter becomes ever poorer and poorer.
As things are, it is a fact that science has not grown richer in
ideas. The ideas of antiquity are far more replete with life, far
loftier and grander. The ideas of Darwinism are like a squeezed lemon.
Darwin merely collected data and connected these with the now
impoverished concepts. This trend of science distinctly points to a
process of gradual atrophy. There is a part of the human brain in
process of decay namely, the part which functions in modern
scientific thought. And this is due to the fact that the part of the
etheric body which should enliven this atrophied brain has not yet
attained the Christ-impulse. Science will remain lifeless until the
Christ-impulse flows into this part of the human brain also, whose
function it is to serve science. This is grounded in the great laws of
the universe. If science continues as heretofore, it will become
increasingly poor in ideas. Ideas will die out more and more. And such
types will appear to an increasing extent in science as are intent
merely upon adding fact to fact, and have a terrible fright when
someone begins to think. It is a terrible experience for a modern
professor when a young candidate brings him a thesis containing even a
modicum of thought. But we have an Anthroposophy today; an
Anthroposophy which will bring home the Christ-impulse to mankind in
ever clearer fashion, and thereby supply the etheric body with life to
an increasing extent. It will supply such abundant life that the
parched portion of the brain which is responsible for our modern
scientific thought will be rendered supple. This is an example of the
revitalization of the perishing human members by the Christ-impulse,
as it gradually penetrates into the life of humanity. As time goes on,
this perishing process would spread to other parts of the human being;
nevertheless for each perished part, the Christ-impulse will flow into
mankind, and, at the end of human evolution, all the members which
would have perished, failing the Christ-impulse, will be revitalized
by it. That impulse will then have permeated the whole etheric body,
and the latter will have become one with it. The first impetus to the
gradual regeneration of mankind, the first impulse to the resurrection
of man was given at a particular moment, beautifully described in the
Gospel of St. John.
Let us picture Christ as a universal Being come into the world; let us
think of the beginning of His great work as accomplished in an etheric
body penetrated through and through by Himself. For the etheric body
of Jesus of Nazareth had been transformed by Christ into precisely so
perfect a vehicle that it could impart new life even to the physical
body. The instant in which the etheric body of Jesus of Nazareth (in
which Christ then was) had become capable of imbuing the physical body
with new life in the fullest sense, in that instant the etheric body
of Christ appears transfigured. The writer of the Gospel of St. John
describes the moment:
‘Father, glorify Thy name. And there came a voice out of Heaven. I
have both glorified it and will glorify it again.
‘The multitude therefore that stood by and heard it said it had
thundered.’
It is said that the people who stood by heard the thunder; but it is
nowhere stated that any person who had not been duly prepared could
have heard it.
‘Others said an angel had spoken to Him.
‘Jesus answered and said, this voice hath come not for my sake but for
your sakes.’
Why was this? So that all who are around Him might understand what had
happened. And Christ speaks of what had happened, saying:
‘Now is the judgment of this world; now shall the Prince of this world
be cast out.’
Lucifer-Ahriman was cast out of the physical body of Christ in that
moment. The great example is there, which in future must be followed
by the whole of mankind. The hindrances of Lucifer-Ahriman must be
cast out of the physical body through the Christ-impulse. Man's
physical body must be so vivified by the impulse of Christ that the
fruits of the mission of the Earth may be carried over into the times
which will follow the Earth-period.
|
Last Modified: 02-Nov-2024
|
The Rudolf Steiner e.Lib is maintained by:
The e.Librarian:
elibrarian@elib.com
|
|
|
|
|