III
Bern, 4th November, 1919
The phase of
evolution beginning in our own time has a very special
character. The same may, of course, be said of each epoch but
in every case it is a matter of defining the particular
characteristics. The present phase of evolution may be
characterised in a general way by saying that all the
experiences confronting mankind in the physical
world during the earth's further existence will represent a
decline, a retrogression. The time when human progress was
made possible through the constant refinement of the physical
forces, is already over. In the future, too, mankind will
progress, but only through spiritual development,
through development on a higher level than that of the
processes of the physical plane. Men who rely entirely on the
processes of the physical plane will find in them no source
of satisfaction. An indication given in spiritual science a
long time ago, in the Lecture-Course on the Apocalypse,
[Note 1]
namely that we are heading for
the “War of All against All”, must from now
onwards be grasped in all its significance and gravity; its
implications must not remain in the realm of theory but also
come to expression in the actions, the whole behaviour of
men.
The fact that
— to use a colloquialism — people in the future
are not going to get much fun out of developments on the
physical plane, will bring home to them that further
evolution must proceed from spiritual forces.
This can be
understood only by surveying a lengthy period of evolution
and applying what is discovered to experiences that will
become more and more general in the future. The trend of
forces that will manifest in the well nigh rhythmical onset
of war and destruction — processes of which the present
catastrophe is but the beginning — will become only too
evident. It is childish to believe that anything connected
with this war can bring about a permanent era of peace for
humanity on the physical plane. That will not be so. What
must come about on the earth is spiritual
development. Its direction and purport will be clear to
us if, after surveying a comparatively lengthy epoch
preceding the Mystery of Golgotha, we bear in mind something
of the meaning of the Mystery of Golgotha and then try to
envisage the impulse of that Event working in the future
evolution of mankind.
We have studied
the Mystery of Golgotha from many different points of view
and will do so again to-day by characterising, very briefly,
the civilisation which preceded it — let us say as far
back as the third millennium B.C. —
and then continued for a time as Pagan culture in the period of
Christian development itself.
Within this
Pagan culture, the utterly different Hebraic-Jewish culture
took root, having Christianity as its offspring.
The nature of
Pagan culture can best be understood if we realise that it
was the outcome of knowledge, vision and action born of
forces much wider in range than those belonging to present
earthly existence. It was actually through Hebraic culture
that the moral element was first inculcated into humanity. In
Paganism the moral element did not occupy a place
separate and apart; this Pagan culture was such that man felt
himself a member of the whole cosmos.
This is
something we must particularly bear in mind. — The
human being living on earth within the old Pagan world felt
himself membered into the whole cosmos. He felt how the
forces at work in the movements of the stars extend into his
own actions, or, better said, into the forces taking effect
in his actions. What later passed for astrology, and does so
still, is but a reflection — and a very misleading one at
that — of the ancient wisdom gleaned from contemplation
of the stars in their courses and then used as the basis for
precepts governing human action.
These ancient
civilisations can be understood only if light is thrown by
spiritual science upon human evolution in its outer aspect
some four or five thousand years before Christ.
We are apt to
speak in rather a matter-of-fact way of the second or the
first Post-Atlantean epochs, but we err if we picture man's
existence on the earth in the fifth, sixth or seventh
millennia B.C. as having been similar to our present
existence. It is quite correct that men living on the earth
in those ancient times had a kind of instinctive soul-life,
in a certain respect more akin to the soul-life of animals
than to that of present-day man. But it is a very one-sided
conception of human life to say that in those ancient times
men were more like animals. In tenor of soul, the human being
then moving about the earth was, it is true, more like the
animal; but those human-animal bodies were used by beings of
soul-and-spirit who felt themselves members of the
super-sensible worlds, above all of the cosmic worlds. And
provided we go back far enough, say to the fifth
pre-Christian millennium, it may be said that men made use of
animal bodies as instruments rather than feeling themselves
within those bodies. To characterise these men accurately,
one would have to say that when they were awake, they moved
about with an instinctive life of soul like that of animals,
but into this instinctive life of soul there shone something
like dreams from their sleeping state, waking dreams. And in
these waking dreams they perceived how they had descended, to
use animal bodies merely as instruments. This inner,
fundamental tenor of the human soul then came to expression
as a religious rite, in the Mithras cult with its main symbol
of the God Mithras riding on a bull, above him the starry
heavens to which he belongs, and below him the earth
to which the bull belongs. This symbol was not, strictly
speaking, a symbol to these men of old; it was a vision of
reality. Man's whole tenor of soul made him say to
himself: When I am outside my body at night I belong to the
forces of the cosmos, of the starry heavens; when I wake in
the morning, I make use of animal instincts in an animal
body.
Then human
evolution passed, figuratively speaking, into a period of
twilight. A certain dimness, a certain lethargy, spread over
the life of humanity; the cosmic dreams receded and instinct
gained the upper hand.
The attitude of
soul formerly prevailing in men was preserved through the
Mysteries, mainly through the Asiatic Mysteries. But in the
fourth millennium B.C. and until the
beginning of the third, humanity in general — when
uninfluenced by the Mystery wisdom — lived an
existence pervaded by a more or less dim, twilight
consciousness. In Asia and the then known
world, it may be said that during the fourth and at the
beginning of the third millennium before the Mystery of
Golgotha, man's life of soul was dim and instinctive. But the
Mysteries were there, into which, through the powerful rites
and ceremonies, the spiritual worlds were able to penetrate.
And it was from these centres that men received
illumination.
At the
beginning of the third millennium a momentous event took
place. — The root-cause of this dim, more instinctive
life may be characterised by saying that as a being of
spirit-and-soul, man was still unable at that time to make
use of the human organs of intellect. These organs were
already within him, they had taken shape in his physical
constitution, but the being of spirit-and-soul could not make
use of them. Thus men could not acquire knowledge through
their own thinking, through their own powers of intellectual
discernment. They were dependent upon what was imparted to
them from the Mysteries. And then, about the beginning of the
third millennium, a momentous event took place in the east of
Asia.
A child of a
distinguished Asiatic family of the time was allowed to grow
up in the precincts of the Mystery-ceremonies. Circumstances
were such that this child was actually permitted to take part
in the ceremonies, undoubtedly because the priests conducting
the rites in the Mysteries felt it as an inspiration that
such a child must be allowed to participate. And when the
being incarnate in that child had reached the age of about 40
— approximately that age — something very
remarkable came to light. It became evident and there is no
doubt at all that the priests of the Mysteries had foreseen
the event prophetically — it became evident that this
man who had been allowed to grow up in the precincts of one
of the Mystery-centres in East Asia, began suddenly, at the
age of about 4o, to grasp through the faculty of human
intellect itself what had formerly come into the Mysteries
through revelation, and only through revelation. He was as it
were the first to make use of the organs of human intellect,
but still in association with the Mysteries.
Translating
into terms of our present language how the priests of the
Mysteries spoke of this matter, we must say: In this man,
Lucifer himself was incarnated — no more and no less
than that! — It is a significant, momentous fact that
in the third millennium before Christ an incarnation of
Lucifer in the flesh actually took place in the east of Asia.
And from this incarnation of Lucifer in the flesh — for
this Being became a Teacher — there went forth what is
described as the pre-Christian, Pagan culture which still
survived in the Gnosis of the earliest Christian
centuries.
It would be
wrong to pass derogatory judgment on this Lucifer-culture.
For all the beauty produced by Greek civilisation, even the
insight that is still alive in ancient Greek philosophy and
in the tragedies of Aeschylus would have been impossible
without this Lucifer-incarnation.
The influence
of the Lucifer-incarnation was still powerful in the south of
Europe, in the north of Africa and in Asia Minor during the
first centuries of Christendom. And when the Mystery of
Golgotha had taken place on earth, it was essentially the
Luciferic wisdom through which it could be understood. The
Gnosis, which set about the task of grasping the import of
the Mystery of Golgotha, was impregnated through and through
with Luciferic wisdom. It must therefore be emphasised,
firstly, that at the beginning of the third Millennium
B.C.
there was a Chinese incarnation of Lucifer; at the beginning
of our own era the incarnation of Christ took place. And to
begin with, the significance of the incarnation of Christ was
grasped because the power of the old Lucifer-incarnation
still survived. This power did not actually fade from man's
faculty of comprehension until the fourth century
A.D.; and even then, it had its
aftermath, its ramifications.
To these two
incarnations, the Lucifer-incarnation in ancient times and
the incarnation of the Christ which gives the earth its
meaning, a third incarnation will be added in a future not so
very far distant. And the events of the present time are
already moving in such a way as to prepare for it.
Of the
incarnation of Lucifer at the beginning of the third
millennium B.C., we must say: through Lucifer, man has
acquired the faculty of using the organs of his intellect, of
his power of intellectual discernment. It was Lucifer
himself, in a human body, who was the first to grasp through
the power of intellect, what formerly could be imparted to
man only through revelation, namely, the content of the
Mysteries.
What is now in
preparation and will quite definitely come to pass on earth
in a none too distant future, is an actual incarnation of
Ahriman.
As you know,
since the middle of the fifteenth century we have been living
in an era in which it behoves mankind to come more and more
into possession of the full power of consciousness.
It is of the very greatest importance that men should
approach the coming incarnation of Ahriman with full
consciousness of this event. The incarnation of Lucifer could
be recognised only by the prophetic insight of the priests of
the Mysteries. Men were also very unconscious of what the
incarnation of Christ and the Event of Golgotha really
signified. But they must live on towards the incarnation of
Ahriman with full consciousness amid the shattering events
which will occur on the physical plane. Amid the perpetual
stresses of war and other tribulations of the immediate
future, the human mind will become very inventive in the
domain of physical life. And through this very growth of
inventiveness in physical life — which cannot be
averted in any way or by any means — the bodily
existence of a human individuality in whom Ahriman can
incarnate, will become possible and inevitable.
From the
spiritual world this Ahrimanic power is preparing for
incarnation on the earth, is endeavouring in every
conceivable way to make such preparation that the incarnation
of Ahriman in human form may be able to mislead and corrupt
mankind on earth to the uttermost. A task of mankind during
the next phase of civilisation will be to live towards the
incarnation of Ahriman with such alert consciousness that
this incarnation can actually serve to promote a higher,
spiritual development, inasmuch as through Ahriman himself
man will become aware of what can, or shall we say, can
not be achieved by physical life alone. But men must
go forward with full consciousness towards this incarnation
of Ahriman and become more and more alert in every domain, in
order to recognise with greater and greater clarity those
trends in life which are leading towards this Ahrimanic
incarnation. Men must learn from spiritual science to find
the key to life and so be able to recognise and learn to
control the currents leading towards the incarnation of
Ahriman. It must be realised that Ahriman will live among men
on the earth, but that in confronting him men will themselves
determine what they may learn from him, what they may receive
from him. This, however, they will not be able to do unless,
from now onwards, they take control of certain spiritual and
also unspiritual currents which otherwise are used by Ahriman
for the purpose of leaving mankind as deeply unconscious as
possible of his coming; then, one day, he will be able to
appear on earth and overwhelm men, tempting and luring them
to repudiate earth-evolution, thus preventing it from
reaching its goal. To understand the whole process of which I
have been speaking, it is essential to recognise the
character of certain currents and influences —
spiritual or the reverse.
Do you not see
the continually growing number of people at the present time
who do not want any science of the spirit, any knowledge of
the spiritual? Do you not see how numerous are the people to
whom the old forces of religion no longer give any inner
stimulus? — Whether they go to church or not is a
matter of complete indifference to large numbers of human
beings nowadays. The old religious impulses mean nothing to
them. But neither will they bring themselves to give a
thought to what can stream into our civilisation as new
spiritual life. They resist it, reject it, regard it as
folly, as something inconvenient; they will not allow
themselves to have anything to do with it. But, you see, man
as he lives on earth is veritably a unity. His spiritual
nature cannot be separated from his physical nature; both
work together as a unity between birth and death. And even if
man does not receive the spiritual through his faculties of
soul, the spiritual takes effect, nevertheless. Since the
last third of the nineteenth century the spiritual has been
streaming around us; it is streaming into earthly evolution.
The spiritual is there in very truth — only men are not
willing to receive it.
But even if
they do not accept the spiritual, it is there! And
what becomes of it? Paradoxical as it may seem — for
much that is true seems paradoxical to the modern mind
— in those people who refuse the spiritual and like
eating and drinking best of all things in life, the spiritual
streams, unconsciously to them, into the processes of eating
and digestion. This is the secret of that march into
materialism which began about the year 184o, or rather was
then in active preparation. Those who do not receive the
spiritual through their souls, receive it to-day none the
less: in eating and drinking they eat and drink the spirit.
They are “eaters” of the soul-and-spirit. And in
this way the spirit that is streaming into earth-evolution
passes over into the Luciferic element, is conveyed to
Lucifer. Thereby the Luciferic power which can then be of
help to the Ahrimanic power for its later incarnation, is
constantly strengthened. This must come to the knowledge of
those who admit the fact that in the future men will either
receive spiritual knowledge consciously or consume the spirit
unconsciously, thereby delivering it into the hands of the
Luciferic powers.
This stream of
spirit-and-soul-consumption is particularly encouraged by
Ahriman because in this way he can lull mankind into greater
and greater drowsiness, so that then, through his
incarnation, he will be able to come among men and fall upon
them unawares because they do not confront him
consciously.
But Ahriman can
also make direct preparation for his incarnation, and he does
so. Certainly, men of our day also have a spiritual life, but
it is purely intellectual, unconnected with the spiritual
world. This purely intellectual life is becoming more and
more widespread; at first it took effect mainly in the
sciences, but now it is leading to mischiefs of every kind in
social life as well. What is the essential character of this
intellectual life?
This
intellectual life has very little to do with the true
interests of men! I ask you: how many teachers do you not see
to-day, passing in and out of higher and lower educational
institutions without bringing any inner enthusiasm to their
science but pursuing it merely as a means of livelihood
— In such cases the interest of the soul is not
directly linked with the actual pursuit. The same thing
happens even at school. Think how much is learnt at the
various stages of life without any real enthusiasm or
interest, how external the intellectual life is becoming for
many people who devote themselves to it! And how many there
are to-day who are forced to produce a mass of intellectual
material which is then preserved in libraries and, as
spiritual life, is not truly alive!
Everything that
is developing as intellectual life without being suffused by
warmth of soul, without being quickened by enthusiasm,
directly furthers the incarnation of Ahriman in a way that is
after his own heart. It lulls men to sleep in the way I have
described, so that its results are advantageous to
Ahriman.
There are
numerous other currents in the spiritual or unspiritual life
which Ahriman can turn to his advantage. You have lately
heard — and you are still hearing it — that
national states, national empires must be founded. A great
deal is said about “freedom of the individual
peoples”. But the time for founding empires based on
relationships of blood and race is past and over in the
evolution of mankind. If an appeal is made to-day to
national, racial and similar relationships, to relationships
arising out of the intellect and not out of the spirit, then
disharmony among mankind will be intensified. And it is this
disharmony among mankind which the Ahrimanic power can put to
special use. Chauvinism, perverted patriotism in every form
— this is the material from which Ahriman will build
just what he needs.
But there are
other things as well. Everywhere to-day we see parties being
formed for one object or another. People nowadays have no
discernment, nor do they desire to have it where party
opinions and party programmes are concerned. With
intellectual ingenuity, proof can be furnished in support of
the most radically opposing theories. Very clever arguments
can be used to prove the soundness of Leninism — but the
same applies to directly contrary principles and also to what
lies between the two extremes. An excellent case can be made
out for every party programme: but the one who establishes
the validity of the opposite programme is equally right. The
intellectualism prevailing among men to-day is not capable of
demonstrating the inner potentialities and values of
anything. It can furnish proofs; but what is intellectually
proved should not be regarded as of real value or efficacy in
life. Men oppose one another in parties because the soundness
of every party opinion — at any rate the main party
opinions — can be proved with equal justification. Our
intellect remains at the surface-layer of understanding and
does not penetrate to the deeper layer where the truth
actually lies. This, too, must be fundamentally and
thoroughly understood.
People to-day
prefer to let their intellect remain on the surface and not
to penetrate with deeper forces to those levels where the
essential nature of things is disclosed. It is only necessary
to look around a little, for even where it takes its most
external form, life often reveals the pitfalls of current
predilections. People love numbers and figures in science,
but they also love figures in the social sphere as well.
Social science consists almost entirely of statistics. And
from statistics, that is to say from figures, the weightiest
conclusions are reached. Well, with figures too, anything can
be proved and anything believed; for figures are not a means
whereby the essential reality of things can be proved —
they are simply a means of deception! Whenever one fails to
look beyond figures to the qualitative, they can be
utterly deceptive.
The following
is an obvious example. — There is, or at least there
used to be, a great deal of argument about the nationality of
the Macedonians. In the political life of the Balkan
peninsula, much depended upon the statistics compiled there.
The figures are of just as much value as those contained in
other statistics. Whether statistics are compiled of wheat
and rye production, or of the numbers of Greek, Serbian or
Bulgarian nationals in Macedonia — in regard to what
can be proved by these means it is all the same.
From the figures quoted for the Greeks, for the Bulgarians,
for the Serbians, very plausible conclusions can be drawn.
But one can also have an eye for the qualitative element, and
then one often finds it recorded that the father was Greek,
one son was Bulgarian, another was Serbian. — What is at
the back of it you can puzzle out for yourselves! —
These statistics are taken as authoritative, whereas in this
case they were compiled solely in support of party aims. It
stands to reason that if the father is really a Greek, the
two sons are also Greeks. But the procedure adopted there is
just an example of many other things that are done with
figures. Ahriman can achieve a great deal through figures and
numbers used in this way as evidence of proof.
A further means
of which Ahriman can avail himself is again one that will
seem paradoxical. As you know, we have been concerned in our
movement to study the Gospels in the light of spiritual
science. But these deeper interpretations of the Gospels
which are becoming more and more necessary in our time, are
rejected on all sides, just as spiritual science as a whole
is rejected.
The people who
often profess humility in these matters — and they are
insistent about it — are actually the most arrogant of
all. More and more generally it is being said that people
should steep themselves in the very simplicity of the Gospels
and not attempt to understand the Mystery of Golgotha by
entering into the complexities of spiritual science. Those
who feign unpretentiousness in their study of the Gospels are
the most arrogant of all, for they despise the honest search
for knowledge demanded in spiritual science. So arrogant are
they that they believe the highest revelations of the
spiritual world can be garnered without effort, simply by
browsing on the simplicity of the Gospels. What claims to be
“humble” or “simple” to-day is often
supreme arrogance. In sects, in religious confessions —
it is there that the most arrogant of men are to be
found.
It must be
remembered that the Gospels came into existence at a time
when the Luciferic wisdom still survived. In the first
centuries of Christendom, men's understanding of the Gospels
was quite different from what it came to be in later times.
To-day, people who cannot deepen their minds through
spiritual science merely pretend to understand the Gospels.
In reality they have no idea even of the original meaning of
the words; for the translations that have been made into the
different languages are not faithful reproductions of the
Gospels; often they are scarcely even reminiscent of the
original meaning of the words in which the Gospels were
composed.
Real
understanding of the intervention of the Christ Being in
earthly evolution is possible to-day only through spiritual
science. Those who want to study, or actually do study the
Gospels “without pretention” — as the
saying goes — cannot come to any inner realisation of
the Christ Being as He truly is, but only to an illusory
picture, or, at very most, a vision or hallucination of the
Christ Being. No real connection with the Christ Impulse can
be achieved to-day merely through reading the Gospels —
but only an hallucinatory picture of the Christ. Hence the
prevalence of the theological view that the Christ was not
present in the man Jesus of Nazareth, who was simply an
historical figure like Socrates or Plato or others, although
possibly more exalted. The “simple man of
Nazareth” is an ideal even to the theologians. And very
few of them indeed can make anything of an event like Paul's
vision at the gate of Damascus, because without the deepened
knowledge yielded by spiritual science the Gospels can give
rise only to an hallucination of the Christ, not to vision of
the Real Christ. And so Paul's vision at Damascus is also
regarded as an hallucination.
Deeper
understanding of the Gospels in the light of spiritual
science is essential to-day, for the apathy that takes hold
of people who are content to live merely within the arms of
the denominations will be used to the utmost by Ahriman in
order to achieve his goal — which is that his
incarnation shall catch men unawares. And those who believe
they are being most truly Christian by rejecting any
development of the conception of the Christ Mystery, are, in
their arrogance, the ones who do most to promote Ahriman's
aims. The denominations and sects are positively spheres of
encouragement, breeding-grounds for Ahriman. It is futile to
gloss these things over with illusions. Just as the
materialistic attitude, rejecting the spiritual altogether
and contending that man is a product of what he eats and
drinks, furthers Ahriman's aims, so are these aims furthered
by the stubborn rejection of everything spiritual and
adherence to the literal, “simple” conception of
the Gospels.
You see, a
barrier which prevents the single Gospels from unduly
circumscribing the human mind, has been erected through the
fact that the Event of Golgotha is described in the Gospels
from four — seemingly contradictory — sides. Only
a little reflection will show that this is a protection from
too literal a conception. In sects, however, where
one Gospel only is taken as the basis of the
teaching — and such sects are quite numerous —
pitfalls, stupefaction and hallucination are generated. In
their day, the Gospels were given as a necessary
counterweight to the Luciferic Gnosis; but if no attempt is
made to develop understanding of their content, the aims of
Ahriman are furthered, not the progress of mankind. In the
absolute sense, nothing is good in itself, but is always good
or bad according to the use to which it is put. The best can
be the worst if wrongly used. Sublime though they are, the
Gospels can also have the opposite effect if men are too lazy
to search for a deeper understanding based on spiritual
science.
Hence there is
a great deal in the spiritual and unspiritual currents of the
present time of which men should be acutely aware, and
determine their attitude of soul accordingly. Upon the
ability and willingness to penetrate to the roots of such
matters will depend the effect which the incarnation of
Ahriman can have upon men, whether this incarnation will lead
them to prevent the earth from reaching its goal, or bring
home to them the very limited significance of intellectual,
unspiritual life. If men rightly take in hand the currents
leading towards Ahriman, then simply through his incarnation
in earthly life they will recognise the Ahrimanic influence
on the one side, and on the other its polar opposite —
the Luciferic influence. And then the very contrast between
the Ahrimanic and the Luciferic will enable them to perceive
the third reality. Men must consciously wrestle through to an
understanding of this trinity of the Christian impulse, the
Ahrimanic and the Luciferic influences; for without this
consciousness they will not be able to go forward into the
future with the prospect of achieving the goal of
earth-existence.
Spiritual
science must be taken in deep earnestness, for only so can it
be rightly understood. It is not the outcome of any sectarian
whim but something that has proceeded from the fundamental
needs of human evolution. Those who recognise these needs
cannot choose between whether they will or will not endeavour
to foster spiritual science. On the contrary they will say to
themselves: The whole physical and spiritual life of men must
be illumined and pervaded by the conceptions of spiritual
science!
Just as once in
the East there was a Lucifer-incarnation, and then, at the
mid-point, as it were, of world-evolution, the incarnation of
Christ, so in the West there will be an incarnation of
Ahriman.
This Ahrimanic
incarnation cannot be averted; it is inevitable, for men must
confront Ahriman face to face. He will be the individuality
by whom it will be made clear to men what indescribable
cleverness can be developed if they call to their help all
that earthly forces can do to enhance cleverness and
ingenuity. In the catastrophes that will befall humanity in
the near future, men will become extremely inventive; many
things discovered in the forces and substances of the
universe will be used to provide nourishment for man. But
these very discoveries will at the same time make it apparent
that matter is connected with the organs of intellect, not
with the organs of the spirit but of the intellect. People
will learn what to eat and drink in order to become really
clever. Eating and drinking cannot make them spiritual, but
clever and astute, yes. Men have no knowledge of these things
as yet; but not only will they be striven for, they will be
the inevitable outcome of catastrophes looming in the near
future. And certain secret societies — where
preparations are already in train — will apply these
things in such a way that the necessary conditions can be
established for an actual incarnation of Ahriman on the
earth. This incarnation cannot be averted, for men must
realise during the time of the earth's existence just how
much can proceed from purely material processes! He must
learn to bring under his control those spiritual or
unspiritual currents which are leading to Ahriman.
Once it is
realised that conflicting party programmes can be proved
equally correct, our attitude of soul will be that we do not
set out to prove things, but rather to experience them. For
to experience a thing is a very different matter from
attempting to prove it intellectually.
Equally we
shall be convinced that deeper and deeper penetration of the
Gospels is necessary through spiritual science. The literal,
word-for-word acceptance of the Gospels that is still so
prevalent to-day, promotes Ahrimanic culture. Even on
external grounds it is obvious that a strictly literal
acceptance of the Gospels is unjustified. For as you know,
what is good and right for one time is not right for every
other time. What is right for one epoch becomes Luciferic or
Ahrimanic when practised in a later one. The mere reading of
the Gospel texts has had its day. What is essential now is to
acquire a spiritual understanding of the Mystery of
Golgotha in the light of the truths enshrined in the Gospels.
Many people, of course, find these things disquieting; but
those whose interest is attracted by Anthroposophy must learn
to realise that the levels of culture, gradually piling one
above the other, have created chaos, and that light must
penetrate again into this chaos.
It is
interesting nowadays to listen to someone whose views have
become very extreme, or to read about some burning question
of the day, and then to listen to sermons on the same subject
given by a priest of some denomination who is still steeped
in the form of thought current in bye gone times. There you
face two worlds which you cannot possibly confuse unless you
avoid all attempts to get at the root of these things. Listen
to a modern socialist speaking about social questions and
then, immediately afterwards, to a Catholic preacher speaking
about the same questions. It is very interesting to find two
levels of culture existing side by side but using the words
in an entirely different sense. The same word has quite a
different meaning in each case.
These things
should be seen in the light that will dawn if they are taken
in the earnest spirit we have been trying to convey. People
belonging to definite religions do also come, in the end, to
long in their own way for spiritual deepening. It is by no
means without significance that a man as eminently spiritual
as Cardinal Newman, ardent Catholic though he was, should say
at his investiture as Cardinal in Rome that he could see no
salvation for Christianity other than a new revelation.
In effect, what
Cardinal Newman said was that he could see no salvation for
Christianity other than a new revelation! But he had not the
courage to take a new spiritual revelation
seriously. And so it is with many others. You can read
countless treatises to-day about what is needed in social
life. — Another book has recently appeared:
Socialism,
by Robert Wilbrandt, the son of the poet.
In it the social question is discussed on the foundation of
accurate and detailed knowledge. And finally it is stated
that without the spirit nothing is achieved? That the very
course of events shows that the spirit is necessary. Yes, but
what does such a man really achieve? He gets as far as to
utter the word “spirit”, to pronounce the
abstract word “spirit”; but he refuses to accept,
indeed he rejects, anything that endeavours to make the
spirit really take effect.
For that it is
essential above all to realise that wallowing in
abstractions, however loud the cry for the spirit, is not yet
spiritual, not yet spirit! Vague, abstract chattering about
the spirit must never be confused with the active search for
the content of the spiritual world pursued in
anthroposophical science.
Nowadays there
is much talk about the spirit. But you who accept spiritual
science should not be deluded by such chattering; you should
perceive the difference between it and the descriptions of
the spiritual world attempted in Anthroposophy, where the
spiritual world is described as objectively as the physical
world. You should probe into these differences, reminding
yourselves repeatedly that abstract talk of the spirit is a
deviation from sincere striving for the spirit and that, by
their very talk, people are actually removing themselves from
the spirit. Purely intellectual allusion to the spirit leads
nowhere. — What, then, is “intelligence”?
What is the content of our human intelligence? I can best
explain this in the following way. — Imagine —
and this will be better understood by the many ladies
present! — imagine yourself standing in front of a
mirror and looking into it. The picture presented to you by
the mirror is you, but it has no reality at all. It
is nothing but a reflection. All the intelligence within your
soul, all the intellectual content, is only a mirror-image;
it has no reality. And just as your reflected image is called
into existence through the mirror, so what mirrors itself as
intelligence is called into existence through the physical
apparatus of your body, through the brain. Man is intelligent
only because his body is there. And as little as you can
touch yourself by stretching your hand towards your reflected
image, as little can you lay hold of the spirit if you turn
only to the intellectual — for the spirit is not there!
What is grasped through the intellect, ingenious as it may
be, never contains the spirit itself, but only a picture of
the spirit. You cannot truly experience the spirit if you get
no further than mere intelligence. The reason why
intelligence is so seductive is that it yields a picture, a
reflected picture of the spirit — but not the spirit
itself. It seems unnecessary to go to the inconvenience of
penetrating to the spirit, because it is there — or so,
at least, one imagines. In reality it is only a reflected
picture — but for all that, it is not difficult to talk
about the spirit.
To distinguish
the mere picture from the reality — that is the task of
the tenor of soul which does not merely theorise about
spiritual science but has actual perception of the
spirit.
That is what I
wanted to say to you to-day in order to intensify the
earnestness which should pervade our whole attitude to the
spiritual life as conceived by Anthroposophy. For the
evolution of humanity in the future will depend upon how
truly this attitude is adopted by men of the present day. If
what I have characterised in this lecture continues to be
offered the reception that is still offered to it to-day by
the vast majority of people on the earth, then Ahriman will
be an evil guest when he comes. But if men are able to rouse
themselves to take into their consciousness what we have been
studying, if they are able so to guide it that humanity can
freely confront the Ahrimanic influence, then, when Ahriman
appears, men will acquire, precisely through him, the power
to realise that although the earth must enter inevitably into
its decline, mankind is lifted above earthly existence
through this very fact. When a man has reached a certain age
in physical life, his body begins to decline, but if he is
sensible he makes no complaint, knowing that together with
his soul he is approaching a life that does not run parallel
with this physical decline. There lives in mankind something
that is not bound up with the already prevailing decline of
the physical earth but becomes more and more spiritual just
because of this physical decline.
Let us learn to
say frankly: Yes, the earth is in its decline, and human
life, too, in respect of its physical manifestation; but just
because it is so, let us muster the strength to draw into our
civilisation that element which, springing from mankind
itself, will live on while the earth is in decline, as the
immortal fruit of earth-evolution.
Notes:
Note 1.
Twelve lectures given at Nuremberg, 1908.
[Actually, this reference is to the,
Apocalypse of St. John lecture series (GA# 104)
given at Nuremberg in June of 1908. – e.Ed]
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