Lecture IV
17th March 1923.
By referring to the 4th century
A.D. as a
point in world history that we have for some time now
recognized as very significant, I tried in the lecture
yesterday to show that we can fully understand the evolution
of humanity only when we keep in mind not only what takes
place openly on the stage of history but also what is going
on behind the scenes. I told you yesterday that the 4th
century of our era is to be regarded approximately as the
middle point of the period during which the Spirits of Form,
the Exousiai, were handing over the cosmic thoughts to the
Archai, the Primal Powers of Principalities. The process
lasted for several hundreds of years. And with this
transference is connected the fact — because man has
become dependent in his thoughts upon quite different
spiritual Beings — that his relation to his thoughts is
not at all the same as it was in earlier times.
You must
picture to yourselves how this super-sensible event affects
the course taken in those centuries by outer historical
happenings and also by happenings in the spiritual history of
mankind Whereas previously the Spirits of Form — those
Beings whom the Bible calls the Elohim — ruled over the
cosmic thoughts so that men were obliged unconsciously to
turn to them when wishing to formulate thoughts about things,
the life of thought now came under the rulership of the
Archai, the Primal Powers, who belong to a rank nearer to
man. Yesterday I indicated this proximity pictorially by
saying: here (in the diagram) is the boundary (red)
representing the world of the senses. Everything we see and
become aware of in the world of the senses — colours,
sounds, sensations of warmth — is symbolized by means
of this line. What lies behind the sense perceptions
is the sphere of the Spirits of Form (the Elohim), of the
higher Spirits, the so-called Dynamis, of the Kyriotetes, and
so on. These, then, are the three kingdoms behind the world
of the senses.
When modern
physics becomes natural philosophy it indulges in the
fanciful idea that behind the world of the senses are the
whirling atoms. But that is just a fantastic, materialistic
notion. The truth is that in that sphere weaving colours and
tones are in play; this is because the Spirits of the higher
Hierarchies hold sway there, in the colours, the tones and so
forth.
Before the 4th
Christian century the Spirits of Form held sway, not only in
the impressions of the sense-world, but, above all, also in
the thoughts. The thoughts now pass over to the Archai. These
Beings are, however, nearer to man than the Spirits of Form,
for their realm lies between man and the world of the senses;
only, because they are by nature super-sensible, he is not
aware of them. Then come the Archangeloi, then the Angeloi,
then man himself, and then animals, plants and minerals.
So during the
period I have indicated, this great, all-embracing, mighty
deed lies behind the scenes of world-history: the thoughts
which are in the things and which man draws out of the
things, are no longer solely the possession of the Exousiai,
the Elohim, but of the Archai.
Now it is a
fact in the evolution of the universe that together with the
advance of spiritual Beings, certain individual spiritual
Beings of the Cosmos always remain behind.
[note 1]
Thus in the general advance of spiritual
Beings during this epoch, that is to say, the first centuries
of Christendom, certain Spirits of Form remained stationary
at their former level.
What does this
mean? It means that certain Spirits of Form could not bring
themselves to surrender the world of thoughts to the Archai;
they retained it for themselves. And so, among the spiritual
Beings who hold sway over human happenings, there are the
normally evolved Archai in possession of the world of
thoughts as well as backward Spirits of Form, backward Elohim
Beings, who still retain some sway over the world of
thoughts. Hence in the stream of spirituality holding sway
above humanity, the Archai and the Spirits of Form, the
Elohistic Beings, work together. The position is therefore as
follows a man who through his karma is rightly qualified,
receives the impulses at work in his thinking through the
Archai. The result is that thinking, although it remains
objective, becomes his personal asset. He elaborates the
thoughts more and more as his own personal possession. Other
individuals do not reach this point; they take over the
thoughts either as the legacy bequeathed by their parents and
ancestors, or accept them as conventional thoughts prevailing
in their national or racial community, and so forth.
To this
super-sensible fact which I have sketched for you is to be
traced the whole interplay between individual personalities
— who appear more and more frequently in that era of
vanishing antiquity and the dawning Middle Ages — and
those currents of thought which sway whole groups of men.
This trend becomes apparent in actual geographical areas.
Certain spiritually minded personalities in the Near East,
belonging to Arabian culture, were the first to be influenced
by the Archai, the Primal Powers. The gist of these
thought-impulses spread especially across Africa, over to
Spain, to the whole of Western Europe. This great stream of
thought moves across Africa, through Spain, also influencing
Southern Italy, and up into Western Europe. It is a highly
stimulating current of thought, stemming from the impulses
described. This current of thought lays hold of the
Arabian-Spanish culture which then, at a much later period,
still exercises a strong influence upon thinkers such as
Spinoza, for example. It is an influence which still
persists in nature-knowledge and can be observed in the
thought-impulses of Galileo, Copernicus,
and others. Whereas the impulses of the Archai are contained
in these currents of thought, and in what becomes history as
a result of them, we also see, forcing its way into
world-happenings everywhere, trends which lie more under the
influence of the backward Spirits of Form, who now, on their
side, send impulses into men. And again we see a different
stream of thought and happenings moving from Asia towards
Europe. This current of thought found its extreme expression
only later on, when the Turkish hordes surged over from
Asia.
Thus European
life from the 4th century A.D.
onwards is the scene of a
continuous spiritual struggle. The Archai contend with the
backward Exousiai, the Spirits of Form who had remained
behind, for the possession that had once been rightfully
allotted to them in the course of world-history. Everything
that happened in the Middle Ages in a West-to-East direction
and also in an East-to-West direction, all the surging
migrations of the peoples, all the mutual antagonisms and
hostilities from the Hunnish wars to the Turkish wars, from
the tribal migrations to the Crusades, where everything
always takes either a West-to-East or an East-to-West
direction — all this is the physical, the historical
reflection of a spiritual struggle taking place behind the
scenes of world-history. Historical happenings on Earth can
be understood in their reality only when we see them as
reflections of what is being enacted in the super-sensible,
spiritual world between the Beings of the Higher Hierarchies.
Thinking of one
aspect of this fact, we can speak, to begin with, of two
currents or streams. One which I shall mark yellow
in the diagram
[note 2],
brings about the
manifold movements again from West to East; the other stream
presses forward and again back, so that these two streams
constantly interpenetrate. A reflection of what was taking
place in the spiritual world is to be seen in the struggles
arising from migrations of the peoples, in the struggles
whereby ancient culture was partially destroyed but in which
that culture was permeated now by human individuality.
We can devote
ourselves to the following study, by asking: What would have
resulted from civilization if the different peoples had not
begun their migrations, surging over into Europe from Asia
and frequently settling in Europe, and if in these wanderings
the factor of individual personality had not asserted itself
— many a time with violence?
We see how
within these migrations, whole tribes were permeated by a
common spirit. But if we follow history we find that
everywhere within these separate, yet homogeneous tribes
inspired by one common spirit — Ostrogoths, Western
Goths, Lombards, Heruli, Franks, Marcomanni, and so on
— single personalities were stirred by the impulses of
individuality. Everywhere we see happenings which on the one
side represent the continuing stream of the impulses of the
old, no longer really lawful Spirits of Form, and on the
other, the now lawfully established Spirits of Personality,
the Archai.
If history were
related accurately, with more attention given to the
influence of spiritual forces in what is for the most part
described merely as tribal warfare, then it would be clear
how these two forms of thought-impulses in humanity actually
dominated life in the days of the folk migrations.
As I said, we
can reflect as follows: What would European civilization have
become if those partly barbaric peoples had not surged over
from East to West and with the youthful vigour of personality
in individuals had not poured down into the outworn
Graeco-Roman world of culture?
On the other
side we may ask: What kind of European civilization would
these partly barbaric tribes have been able to inaugurate if
what was contained in Graeco-Roman civilization, having been
taken over by the Archai, the Spirits of Personality, had not
been inculcated into it?
That is in
truth tremendously interesting. If we consider the Greeks,
indeed even the Romans, we see quite clearly that their
thoughts — their scientific, aesthetic, political and
social thoughts — are unmistakably derived from the
influences coming from the Exousiai, the Spirits of Form. We
need only look — not with the crude vision of modern
historical treatises but with somewhat finer perception
— at persons such as Pericles, Alcibiades, or even
Sulla, indeed even Hannibal, although the hallmarks of
personality are strong in him, and then also at Caesar
— we need only think of these individuals and we shall
certainly find that thoughts hold sway in them still as
cosmic forces, as something instinctive.
This is because
their thoughts come from the Spirits of Form. Then a
personality appears who stands with his soul in the conflict
between the newly empowered Spirits of Personality and the
Spirits of Form who were no longer in authority. The
personality whose soul is entangled in the conflict, is
Augustine, the Catholic Church Father. I have described the
struggles of his soul to you from many different sides. When,
however, we regard these struggles as the earthly reflection
of a cosmic, super-sensible happening, we see in this
individual, who in his youth inclined to Manichaeism, who
then became in the strictest sense an orthodox Roman Catholic
believer — we see in this spectacle of a soul torn
hither and thither, the earthly image, the earthly reflection
of a cosmic happening behind the evolution of humanity.
Augustine turned to the Manichaeans while his soul was still
influenced by the impulses of the Spirits of Form. These
impulses brought to his soul treasures from earlier ages but
these treasures were no longer suitable for souls belonging
to his time. Through the good and splendid fruits of culture
which had come to him from the backward Spirits of Form,
however, he was prevented from receiving with the full
potentiality of his own personality the new form of thoughts
that could be imparted by the Archai, the Spirits of
Personality, the Beings who had now assumed the rulership of
the thoughts. And he could accept this new state of things
only by surrendering unconditionally to the dogma of the
Church.
A personality
such as Augustine can always be characterized from two sides.
From the viewpoint of earthly existence we can look simply at
the personality and see how the soul-forces battle one with
another. But we can also contemplate the case from the other
side of earthly existence and take account of how such a
personality is guided and led by the divine-spiritual Powers
by the higher Hierarchies. Then, if we adopt the earthly
viewpoint we learn to know a human personality as he lives on
the Earth. If, however, we adopt the other viewpoint, the
super-sensible viewpoint, we can recognize in what way such a
personality is a messenger of the spiritual world. In point
of fact, man is always that. Here on Earth man is an earthly
being and can be regarded as such. It is no bar to the
freedom of this, his earthly existence, that he is, at the
same time, pervaded by the forces of the super-earthly world
— not guided and led, but impelled by them and so at
the same time is a messenger of the super-sensible Powers.
And again, in a
different form, we see this interaction between the backward
Spirits of Form who look for their ‘picked
troops’ so to speak, chiefly over yonder in Asia and
invariably dispatch them to Europe, and the newly empowered
Spirits of Personality, the Archai, who have already advanced
more towards the West and ever and again strive to repel the
influences emanating from the backward Spirits of Form.
In later times
this confused West-to-East and East-to-West fluctuation of
the earthly reflection of higher spiritual impulses confronts
us in the Crusades. Study how the Crusades develop, to begin
with out of a certain impulse connected entirely with the
Archai, the Spirits of Personality, and study what really
powerful purposes led to the Crusades. Then study how the
Crusaders succumb more and more to mass-opinions and how the
suggestive power of these mass-opinions increases. The
farther the Crusaders advance from West to East, the more
firmly is the individual captured by mass-opinions. And then,
when the Crusaders come into the sphere of Asiatic life, mass
impulses spread a cover over what had been implanted by
single individualities into other single individualities.
We see how men
lose their personality We see how the soul-qualities of the
Crusaders degenerate in the East. Under the sway of the
mass-suggestions to which they have succumbed, they cannot
develop the good, moral impulses they brought with them. They
become morally decadent. And this moral decadence of good and
earnest men who have travelled from West to East, allows the
impulses which press from East to West and are rooted in
Mussulman and Turk, to gain the ascendency.
Thus in the
Crusades we see the second fluctuation in world history of a
conflict from East to West and from West to East — a
conflict that is the reflection of the other, the spiritual
struggle between backward Spirits of Form and normally
progressive Archai, Spirits of Personality.
The whole
situation would eventually have been like this. — If we
are looking at Europe, in the West the impulses of the
Spirits of Personality (blue in diagram) would have spread
increasingly, although one-sidedly, and in the East the
impulses of the backward Spirits of Form (violet). You may
take what I am sketching for you today together with other
viewpoints which I have already spoken of here on the subject
of these streams of civilization. In the super-sensible realm
conditions are in constant interplay and we can only
gradually understand them by studying impulses of the
greatest variety.
But the
situation did not remain like this. Certainly, if we go back
to the very early Middle Ages, up to the time of the
Crusades, we may say: In that epoch things were as I have
sketched them here. But then another event came more and more
into play — I mean in the super-sensible world —
namely, that not only have Spirits of Form remained behind,
not only have the Archai advanced, but, as always happens in
the hierarchies of the super-sensible world, while certain
spiritual Beings make normal progress, there are also certain
Beings who overstep the goal.
Thus we see
that in the West, and indeed from the South upwards (red
arrow, left, in diagram) backward Archangeloi intervene in
the whole movement. So that here (above) we have Archai at
their rightful level, but here (below) Archangeloi who have
remained behind at earlier stages, who are actually backward
Beings of earlier stages, who have remained Archangeloi when
they could already have been Archai. That is the nature of
these spiritual Beings.
And so we see
that in Western Europe, normal Archai and abnormal
Archangeloi — if I may use this pedantic expression
— work together to an increasing extent. Geographically
speaking, the Archangeloi take a South-to-North direction,
whereas the Archai and the backward Exousiai (Spirits of
Form) take the West-to-East and East-to-West direction. In
this way we find historical and geographical circumstances
formed on Earth as reflections of the conflicts and
collaborations between higher spiritual Beings.
All that
happens in Western Europe — one may indeed say to this
very day — can be understood as a reflection of the
collaboration between normal Archai and abnormal Archangeloi
and abnormal Archai-Beings who have a strong influence on men
because they are near them; especially do they instil into
men an emotional relationship to their language, that
emotional relationship which as you may gather from the first
lecture has very great significance for them. The whole
nature of man is very strongly affected by the incursion of
these Archangeloi Beings who play such an important rôle
in man's relationship to language. What holds men together
through language, makes them appear fanatically united
through language, becomes intelligible as an earthly
reflection when the super-sensible facts behind it are
known.
Now conditions
on the one side or the other become less pronounced or more
pronounced in the different epochs. In the West we find a
preponderance of the normal Archai, in the South a
preponderance of the impulses of the abnormal Archangeloi. It
is quite possible to characterize the historical life of men
and peoples from the viewpoint of the super-sensible
happenings.
Further, it
must be said that what would have happened in the East was
essentially modified through the fact that the backward
Spirits of Form who are naturally very powerful, were
strongly influenced by the normally developed Archangeloi
working from North to South. Something deriving especially
from the Turks, Mongols and other such peoples, dominated as
they were by the backward Spirits of Form, by Elohistic
Beings, thrust itself, as it were, into that wild turmoil and
commotion; something coming down from the North mingled with
it, something derived — if I may use the expression
— from good Archangeloi who are very near to man, who
instil into every individual human soul something that
quashes the group spirit which actually stems from backward
Spirits of Form.
Again it is the
case that in different epochs of world-history, the turmoil
of a terrible, impersonal, unindividualized group spirit
holds sway; in other epochs individualities gain the upper
hand. If someone would present the remarkable history of
Russia in this way as a reflection of the collaboration of
spiritual Beings of the higher Hierarchies, tremendous light
would be shed on what occurs in particular epochs of this
history.
We have, then,
in the West (see diagram) a stream flowing from South to
North which mingles with the stream from West to East; and
here too, a stream from North to South also intermingles with
the stream from West to East. But these streams spread out
again and later on we have a South-to-North stream that is
continually being forced into zig-zag oscillations by the
West-to-East impulses (diagram). And, working together with
and into these streams there is the North-to-South current
which again is forced into zig-zag oscillations by the
West-to-East impulses (orange). This drawing-together of the
two streams that have already taken definite shape occurs at
a later period of European evolution, at the time when the
struggles connected with the Reformation begin.
There we see
how a North-to-South stream — but always intermingled
with one from West-to-East bearing within it the strong
forces of the normal Archai — presses into what had
remained behind from the earlier impulses flowing over from
Asia from the backward Spirits of Form. And, because it is
connected with the Spirits of Form, something arises in an
elementary way but nevertheless belongs to the normal
impulses of human evolution.
Study
everything that on the one side streams from North-to-South
from the typical thinking of evangelical Protestantism but
then becomes involved in the most violent, belligerent
controversies, and study too what comes up from the South as
countercurrents which again lead to warlike controversies.
Study, for example, the stream of evangelical Protestantism
having its main direction from North-to-South, and the
Catholic-Jesuit stream with its main direction from
South-to-North, and then you will be able to observe the
complicated interplay of what takes place on Earth as a
picture of the higher spiritual conflicts in the
super-sensible world.
And the outcome
of this is something which as Anthroposophists you must be
able to assess. From modern accounts of the Thirty Years' War
— which Schiller amended only slightly, particularly
those of the early events — it is known that the
religious conflict in Prague led to the episode when the
excited people forced their way into the Town Hall, threw the
two politicians Martinitz and Slawata and then the
confidential secretary Fabricius out of the window. (As you
know, nothing happened to them because they fell on a
refuse-heap consisting entirely of scraps of waste paper. It
was not what in the ordinary way would be called a
refuse-heap but was just a heap of scraps of paper, for at
that time it was not customary to use a waste-paper basket ;
scraps of paper were just thrown out of the window.)
Eventually, then, an excited crowd threw those politicians
after the scraps. ... If one begins at that point and
follows up the happenings — well, it is like a
fruitless wandering over the map of Europe: here, one side is
victorious, there, the other; here, some princedom is
invaded, there, a General marches in that direction, and so
on and so forth. It is like rambling over the map of Europe,
no matter whether the route is sketched or merely described.
In school one is always in despair about such extremely
important happenings as the Thirty Years' War because on the
basis of the usual historical accounts one can only narrate
in such a way that the pupils will soon forget it again, for
it is all a sheer jumble. There is nothing to give direction
to individual trains of thought. If, however, we look for the
truth of the situation, we see behind the external reflection
those North-to-South, South-to-North streams which are also
constantly crossed by West-to-East currents.
We see in what
comes from Wallenstein, in what then comes down from
the North, from Gustavus Adolphus and so forth, in
all this we see that what happens externally in history is,
so to speak — again I do not say led and guided —
impelled by the super-sensible forces behind the events. In
spite of this, however, men are free beings,
although natural impulses also play a part in their deeds. We
cannot say that a man becomes unfree because when he looks
out of the window and sees that it is raining, he takes his
umbrella with him and opens it outside; he is adapting
himself to the nature-forces. With the activities of his soul
and Spirit man stands within the realm of spiritual impulses,
within the nexus of the spiritual forces; yet he remains a
free being.
But what takes
place on the plane of world-history can be grasped only when
it is grasped in the light of the super-sensible realities
behind it. We can then perceive the concrete impulse given to
world-historical events by spiritual Powers, whereas by
speaking only of an abstract Divinity no true vision is
possible.
Those who speak
only of an abstract Divinity must actually — since they
are bound to think of this Divinity as operative everywhere
— seek it, let us say, in a Turkish battle of the
Middle Ages, both on the side of the Turks and also on the
side of those against whom the Turks were fighting! Thus the
abstract Divinity is there at war with itself, engaged in a
self conflict.
When spiritual
Beings whose mutual relationships arise, as I have shown,
from the fact that certain tasks pass over from one group to
another but also that certain groups lag behind, others reach
normal stages, others again storm forward — when we
realize that in the spiritual world there is a multiplicity
of Beings struggling against each other yet able to be
mutually helpful, only then does it become possible, without
being guilty of inconsistencies, to apply human concepts to
happenings taking place behind the scenes of world-history in
the super-sensible world.
Concrete
insight then becomes possible. We perceive how, in the West,
unauthorized Archangeloi intervene in authorized activity of
the Archai and how, in consequence, deterioration of the good
elements takes place continually in the struggles involved.
We see how, in the East, Archangeloi working for the good as
helping, protecting Spirits, neutralize what would otherwise
have developed through the backward Spirits of Form in a way
unworthy of full humanity. And when these two streams come
together we see how in Middle Europe the incessant squabbling
between Reformation and Counter-Reformation assumes the
dimension reached by these forces in the Thirty Years' War
and in the subsequent conflicts.
Our study will
be twofold: we study the individual human being but not alter
the manner of orthodox science, seeing only that this muscle
is situated here, that muscle somewhere else, this bone here,
that nerve there ... no, we study the whole man in his
physical make-up as a reflection of the super-sensible
reality; and we know that the plane of thought belonging to
the physical man as he stands on Earth was worked upon, in
conjunction with the Spirits of the higher Hierarchies
between death and a new life, by the individual himself who
incarnates on Earth. Thus we study the individual man as a
mirror-image of a super-sensible archetypal human figure.
And secondly we
study what happens in history as the reflection of an event
enacted behind the scenes of history in the super-sensible
world, where great hosts of super-sensible Beings enter into
‘social relationships’ — if I may use
earthly terms — with each other, just as men do on
Earth. Only the actions of these super-earthly social Beings
are such that their impulses play in upon the Earth and come
to expression in the actions of men.
It is
particularly important for men of the present day to perceive
in detail how man is a reflection of the super-sensible, and
how historical events are also reflections of the
super-sensible. This is the only path by which man can find
his way back again to the divine-spiritual world. Purely
abstract ideal of a Divinity are still able to influence
those who have not begun to perceive and think in the sense
of modern spiritual life. But the number of the latter
constantly diminishes and the number of those who are willing
to perceive and think will increase all the time. These
people must be led back once again to the religious life.
This can succeed only if the concretely real operations of
the spiritual world are placed before the eyes of their
souls, if they are not presented with an abstract,
generalized thought of a Divinity about which nothing is
truly conveyed but is referred to merely by an all-embracing
word, with the details not understood.
And so, my dear
friends, one of the tasks which anthroposophical knowledge
has, and ought to have at the present time, has once again
been indicated from yet another point of view.
Notes:
Note 1. See
the lecture-course entitled The Mission of Folk Souls.
(Rudolf Steiner Press).
Note 2.
(Diagram page 46.)
(see Diagram)
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