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Rudolf Steiner e.Lib
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Polarities in the Evolution of Mankind
Rudolf Steiner e.Lib Document
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Polarities in the Evolution of Mankind
On-line since: 30th November, 2018
Polarities in the Evolution of Mankind
Rudolf Steiner e.Lib Document
Lectures Section
Steiner unfolds here the spiritual background to many social
questions around the theme of the polarities of West and East,
materialism and mysticism, knowledge and belief.
He makes visible the forces of decline active in modern civilization
and how these forces are trying to wrest human destiny from
the active participation of human beings. He presents with profound
poignancy how Christ is pouring a new spirit into human evolution.
By Rudolf Steiner
Translator Unknown
Bn 197; GA 197; CW 197
Steiner unfolds here the spiritual background to many social
questions around the theme of the polarities of West and East,
materialism and mysticism, knowledge and belief.
“Looking at the world today we should really consider the most
striking characteristic of social life in the civilized world to be
that the smaller communities of past times have given way to quite
large human communities. ... The civic communities of towns
formed a relative whole.”
He makes visible the forces of decline active in modern civilization
and how these forces are trying to wrest human destiny from
the active participation of human beings. He presents with profound
poignancy how Christ is pouring a new spirit into human evolution.
This is a First Edition, English translation of the eleven lectures given at Stuttgart by Rudolf Steiner in March through
November of 1920, and entitled,
Polarities in the Evolution of Mankind
(also published as,
Polarities in Human Evolution).
They were published in German as,
Gegensaetze in der Menschheitsentwickelung. West und Ost.
Materialismus und Mystik. Wissen und Glauben.
This translation is presented here with the kind permission of the
Rudolf Steiner Nachlassverwaltung,
From Bn 197, GA 197, CW 197.
Copyright © 1987
This e.Text edition is provided with the cooperation of:
The Rudolf Steiner Press
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Thanks to an anonymous donation, this Lecture Series has been made available.
| Cover Sheet |
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| Contents |
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| Lecture 1 |
March 05, 1920 |
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Stuttgart 5 March
1920 The development of conscious awareness;
luciferic and ahrimanic spirits. Early humanity thinking
in images and dependent on higher spirits. Gradual
separation from those spirits; intellectual thinking
developing to train humans in freedom. Ahriman's aims and
purposes. Opposition in Norway.
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| Lecture 2 |
March 07, 1920 |
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Stuttgart 7 March
1920 Different potentials of Asians and
Europeans. Need to understand Christ in a new way.
Development of the intellect from beginning of
postAtlantean period. Intelligence developed in soul and
spirit in the Orient and at the physical level in Europe.
East accepted Christianity into the soul in a way
incomprehensible to modern European scientists. The
rational Western mind was bound to the physical body and
could not understand the Mystery of Golgotha.
Goetheanism. Theosophy of the Theosophical Society as
pre-Christian wisdom. Initiation the precondition for
social thinking.
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| Lecture 3 |
March 09, 1920 |
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Stuttgart 9 March
1920 Changing awareness in political life.
Empires evolving in three stages on earth. Stage 1:
Imperialism of partly prehistoric times; earthly and
hierarchic order one. Present-day example —
pastoral from a bishop. Stage 2: Ruler by the grace of
God. Example: Holy Roman Empire. Stage 3: Substance lost
from words and symbols. Phrase and convention instead.
Need for new social impulses.
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| Lecture 4 |
June 13, 1920 |
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Stuttgart 13 June
1920 Powers of decline in present-day
civilization. Secret societies, Jesuitism and Leninism:
three initiation
streams in the present day. Religious confessions
opposing spiritual science. Their denial of pre-existence
and dogma of eternal hell. Professor Traub's smear
campaign. Opposition from Roman Catholic Press in
Switzerland.
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| Lecture 5 |
June 24, 1920 |
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Stuttgart 24 June
1920 Decline of human civilization as a
consequence of materialism. Material world can only be
truly understood in the spirit. Materialistic view of the
human heart as a pump. Head as the fruit of previous life
on earth. Materialistic view of history. Economic life as
head organ of the social organism, the sphere of rights
as its rhythmical organ and cultural life as its
metabolic organ. Threefold social order, Waldorf School,
Kommender Tag. The destructive quality of untruthfulness.
Spiritual science and and practical life.
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| Lecture 6 |
July 25, 1920 |
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Stuttgart 25 July
1920 Materialism and mysticism. True
perceptiveness as a deed of the human soul. Disguised
materialism in theosophy and spiritism. Materialism of
modern science. Mysticism gives experience of physical
matter by revealing material processes within the human
organism. Mysticism as a disease. Need for transition
from experience in space to one in time. Nature of force
of gravity. Inner experience of force of gravity.
Ahriman, Lucifer, Christ.
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| Lecture 7 |
July 30, 1920 |
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Stuttgart 30 July
1920 Materialism and mysticism on the wrong
road. Active perceptiveness in Anthroposophy. Looking for
nature of matter in the phenomena of the outside world
leads to feeblemindedness; looking for the spirit by
practising inner mysticism leads to childishness.
Politics an illusion: Conservative element ahrimanic,
liberal element luciferic. Fight of Jesuits against
Anthroposophy. Rightness of materialism in its own
sphere.
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| Lecture 8 |
September 21, 1920 |
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Stuttgart 21 September
1920 Distinction between knowledge and belief.
Ancient wisdom had to fade to make freedom possible. As
modern science evolved, knowledge reduced to mere belief.
Jesuitism. Rome as the source spring of materialism. No
longer inner experience connecting with words. Need to
speak of human existence before birth. The threefold
social order and its opponents.
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| Lecture 9 |
November 08, 1920 |
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Stuttgart 8 November
1920 East, Middle and West. The threefold social
order. Sleeping and waking. The threefold nature of the
human being. In the East, life before birth was
experienced in the spirit. This spirit has grown
decadent. In the Middle, culture of material world and
spirit, eminence given to thinking (Hegel). West:
material culture, yet also preparation for future
Imaginations; incipient awareness of principles that go
beyond death. In the East: instinctive wisdom; in the
Middle; dialectics, intellectual life; in the West:
materialism, spirit of economics. East: end (example of
Tolstoy); West: beginning (example of Keely). Mission of
the Middle for the present.
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| Lecture 10 |
November 14, 1920 |
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Stuttgart 14 November
1920 Transition from luciferic to ahrimanic age
and the Christ event to come. Technology; human beings
and machines. Ahrimanic demons active in the present,
luciferic elemental spirits in the past. Appearance of
the etheric Christ in the present time. Ahrimanization of
the world. Increasing stress in human souls. Need to
prepare for the Christ event.
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| Lecture 11 |
November 22, 1920 |
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Stuttgart 22 November
1920 The impersonal attitude of modern science.
The Christ spirit which has to enter into science. The
threefold social order as 20th century Goetheanism.
Spirit-self, life-spirit and spirit-man cannot evolve
through forces provided by the earth but only through the
Christ. Schiller's letters on aesthetic education and
Goethe's Tale. The mystery play The Portal of
Initiation as a metamorphosis of the creative
potential in Goethe's Tale. Golden, Silver and Brazen
Kings representing the three aspects of the social
organism.
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| Index of Names |
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| Notes |
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Last Modified: 23-Nov-2024
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