VIII
Arnhem,
19th July, 1924
Yesterday
I spoke of the karma of the Anthroposophical Society. To-day I
propose to speak of certain cognate matters, and in such a way that
the present lecture will be comprehensible in itself.
Everything
that will have to be achieved in the present epoch of evolution as a
preparation for spiritual happenings in the near and more distant
future, is connected with what, among anthroposophists, I have often
called the Michael Event. And in connection with this Michael Event I
want to speak to-day about something that concerns
the Anthroposophical Movement.
In
speaking of a happening such as this Michael Event, it must always be
remembered that the world develops by stages. When we study the
evolution of the world with the faculties which man's earthly life
between birth and death enables him to possess to-day, we see
humanity evolving on the Earth, we see ancient peoples arising from
still earlier peoples; we see that from the background of very
ancient Oriental civilisations, from the Indian, the Chinese, the
Arabian and the Chaldean-Egyptian peoples, the Greeks and the Romans
gradually emerge; then we come to the Middle Ages and finally to our
own age — our modern age with all its
aberrations but also with its great technical achievements. Yet not
only is there this external development of the peoples but as it were
behind it, evolution is also taking place. We can perceive evolution
being passed through not only by mankind but also by spiritual Beings
who are connected in certain ways with the evolution of humanity. In
their ranks are those Beings called the Angeloi — the Angels in
Christian terminology. They are directly connected with
the individual human being. They lead, or guide him in so far
as he needs guidance, from one earthly life to another and are his
Guardians, his Protectors, whenever and wherever he needs their
protection. Therefore, super-sensible though they be and imperceptible
to earthly sight, the Angeloi are directly connected with mankind's
evolution.
In the
next immediately adjacent spiritual realm, the Beings whom we call
the Hierarchy of the Archangeloi, the Archangels, unfold their
activity. The Archangeloi have to do with much that also plays a part
in the evolution of humanity. They have to do, not with the
individual human being, but with groups of human beings. Thus, as I
have said in many anthroposophical lectures, the evolution of
the peoples is under the rulership of Archangelic Beings.
But it is also the case that certain epochs in Earth-evolution
receive their essential impulses from individual Archangeloi. For
example, during the three centuries preceding the last third of the
nineteenth century, namely during the nineteenth, eighteenth,
seventeenth centuries and part of the sixteenth, we must think of the
civilised world as being essentially under the dominion of the
Archangel known to Christians capable of speaking of these things,
as Gabriel. This period was therefore the Age of
Gabriel.
This
particular Gabriel Age is of great significance for the whole
evolution of mankind in modern times, for the following reason.
Since the Mystery of Golgotha took place it has been possible for men
on the Earth to have this realisation: Through the Mystery of
Golgotha, Christ, the sublime Being of the Sun, has come down to the
Earth. He has descended from the Sun to the Earth, entering into the
body of Jesus and uniting Himself with Earth's destiny. But although
the Christ Being has remained united with the Earth, it has not been
possible through the succeeding rulerships of Archangeloi from
the time of the Mystery of Golgotha until that of the dominion of
Gabriel, for the Christ Impulse itself actually to lay hold of the
inner physical and etheric forces of mankind. This became possible
for the first time under the Gabriel impulse which began to work
about three hundred years before the last third of the
nineteenth century. Thus, in reality, it is only since that time
that by way of the forces of heredity
themselves the Christ Impulse has been able to penetrate
humanity inwardly. As yet this has not been achieved.
Gabriel
rules over the whole realm of the physical forces of heredity within
humanity. He is the super-sensible Spirit who is connected essentially
with the sequence of the generations, who
is — if I may put it so — the great
Guardian Spirit of the mothers who bring children into the world.
Gabriel has to do with births, with the embryonic development of the
human being. The forces of Gabriel work in
the spiritual processes underlying the physical process of
propagation. And so it is only since this recent Gabriel rulership
that the physical propagation of mankind on Earth has come into
connection in the real sense with the Christ Impulse.
From the
end of the eighteen-seventies, the rulership
of Michael begins. It is a rulership altogether different
in character from that of Gabriel. Whereas the rulership of the
Archangel in the three preceding centuries comes to expression in
spiritual impulses working in the physical, Michael is the Archangel
who in his rulership has paramountly to do with the powers of the
intelligence in mankind, with everything, therefore, that
concerns the intellectual, the spiritual evolution and culture of
mankind. In any study of the earthly circumstances of humanity it is
extremely important to realise that the Gabriel rulership which in
the spiritual sphere has an effect upon what is most deeply
physical, is always followed by the regency of Michael,
who has to do with the spiritual element in culture.
The Archangel Gabriel,
therefore, is the Divine Guardian of the process of physical
propagation. The Spirit who has to do with the development of the
sciences, of the arts, of the cultural element of the epoch, is the
Archangel known in Christianity as Michael. Over those civilisations
which are predominant in every epoch, seven successive
Archangel-rulerships take place. Six other such rulerships have
therefore preceded the present rulership of Michael. And if,
beginning with Gabriel, we go backwards through these rulerships, we
come to an epoch when Michael again held sway. Every such rulership,
therefore, is always the repetition of earlier, identical rulerships,
and the evolution of the Archangels themselves takes place through
this cyclic progress. After a period of about two thousand years, the
same Archangel always assumes the rulership again within the
predominating civilisation.
But these
periods of rulership, each of which lasts for a little over three
hundred years, are essentially different from one another. The
difference is not always as great as it is between the Michael
rulership and the Gabriel rulership, but the rulerships are,
nevertheless, essentially different. And here we can say: Each
reign of Gabriel is preparatory to an age when the peoples become
more widely separated from one another and more differentiated.
In the age following his dominion the nationalistic tendency also
becomes accentuated. So, if you ask yourself why it is that such
strong nationalistic feeling is asserting itself to-day under the
rulership of Michael, which has now begun, the answer is that
preparation took place spiritually a long time ago; the influence
worked on and then began to decline, but the
after-effects — often worse than the event itself
— continue. It is only by degrees that the impulse of Michael
can make its way into what is, to a great extent, a legacy from the
past reign of Gabriel. But always when an age of Michael dawns, a
longing begins to arise in mankind to overcome racial distinctions
and to spread through all the peoples living on the Earth the highest
and most spiritual form of culture produced by that particular age.
Michael's rulership is always characterised by the growth
of cosmopolitanism, by the
spread of a spiritual impulse among peoples who are ready to receive
it, no matter what language they speak. Of the seven Archangels who
send their impulses into the evolution of humanity, Michael is always
the one who gives the cosmopolitan impulse — and at the
same time the impulse for the spreading of whatever is of most
intrinsic value in a particular epoch.
If we turn
now to past times in the evolution of humanity, asking ourselves in
what period the previous Michael Age occurred, we come to the epoch
which culminated in those cosmopolitan deeds springing from the
impulse of the lofty spiritual culture of Greece, whose fruits were
carried over to Asia through the campaigns of Alexander. There,
developing from the foundations of the ancient culture, we see the
urge to take the spiritual culture of
Greece — the little land of Greece — over
to the Oriental peoples, to Egypt; there is an urge to spread a
cosmopolitan impulse in this way among all the peoples able to
receive it. This cosmopolitan impulse, this urge of the earlier Age
of Michael, to spread over the world all that the Greek culture had
achieved for humanity, was of the very greatest possible
significance. The crowning triumph of that Age was represented, in a
certain sense, by the city of Alexandria in its prime, standing
yonder in North Africa.
These
things came to pass in the preceding Age of Michael. Thereafter the
other six Archangels assume in time their dominions. And in the last
third of the nineteenth century, at the end of the seventies, a new
Michael Age begins. But never yet in the whole of earthly evolution
has the difference between two Ages of Michael been as great as that
between the Michael Age at the time of Alexander and the one in which
we have been living since the end of the seventies of the last
century. For between these two reigns of Michael falls the Event
which gives Earth-evolution its true meaning: the Mystery of Golgotha.
Let us now
consider what it is that Michael has to administer in the spiritual
Cosmos. It is Michael's task to administer a power that is
essentially spiritual, reaching its zenith in man's faculty
of intellectual understanding. Michael is not the Spirit who,
if I may put it so, cultivates intellectuality per se;
the spirituality he bestows strives to bring
enlightenment to mankind in the form of ideas, of thoughts —
but ideas and thoughts that grasp the spiritual. His wish is that man
shall be a free being, but one who discerns in his concepts, in his
thoughts, what comes to him as revelation from the spiritual worlds.
And now
think of the Michael Age at the time of Alexander. As I have so
often said, human beings in our day are extremely
clever — that is to say, they form concepts,
they have ideas; they are intellectual, possessing as it were
a self-made intellectuality. People were clever, too, in
the days of Alexander. Only if in those times they had been asked:
Whence do you derive your concepts, your ideas? — they would
not have said: We have produced them out of ourselves. ... No,
they received into themselves the spiritual revelations, and together
with these revelations, the ideas. They did not regard the ideas as
something which man evolves out of himself, but as something revealed
to him in his spiritual nature. The task of Michael at that time was
to administer this heavenly Intellectuality —
in contrast to earthly
Intellectuality. Michael was the greatest of the Archangels who
have their abode on the Sun. He was the Spirit who sent down from
thence to the Earth not only the Sun's physical-etheric rays but,
within them, the inspired Intellectuality. And in those past
days men knew: the power of Intelligence on Earth is a gift of the
Heavens, of the Sun; it is sent down from the Sun. And the one who
actually sends the spiritual Intellectuality down to the Earth, is
Michael. In the ancient Sun Mysteries this wonderful
Initiation-teaching was given: Michael dwells on the Sun; there he
administers the Cosmic Intelligence. This Cosmic Intelligence,
inspired into human beings, is a gift of Michael.
Then came
the epoch when man was to be made ready to unfold intellect out of
his own, individual force of soul; he was not merely to receive the
Cosmic Intelligence through revelation but to evolve Intelligence out
of his inner forces. Preparation for this was made by
Aristotelianism — that remarkable philosophy which arose
in the twilight period of Greek culture and was the impulse underlying
the campaigns of Alexander the Great in Africa and Asia.
By means
of Aristotelianism, earthly Intelligence emerged as though from the
shell of the Cosmic Intelligence. And from what came to be known as
Aristotelian Logic there arose that intellectual framework on which
the thinking of all subsequent centuries was based; it conditioned
human intelligence.
And now
you must conceive that through this single deed the Michael Impulses
culminated: the earthly-human Intelligence was established,
while, as a result of the campaigns of Alexander, the culture of
Greece was imprinted upon those peoples who at that time were ready
to receive the cosmopolitan impulse.
The epoch
of Michael was followed by that
of Oriphiel. The Archangel Oriphiel assumed dominion. The
Mystery of Golgotha took place. At the beginning of the Christian
era, those human souls who had been conscious of the leadership of
the Archangel Michael in Alexander's time and had participated in the
deeds of which I have just spoken, were gathered around Michael in
the realm of the Sun. Michael had relinquished his dominion for the
time being to Oriphiel, and in the realm of the Sun, together with
those human souls who were to be his servants, Michael witnessed the
departure of Christ from the Sun.
This, too,
is something of which we must be
mindful. — Those human souls who are connected
with the Anthroposophical Movement may say to themselves: We
were united with Michael in the realm of the Sun. Christ, who
hitherto had sent His Impulses towards the Earth from the Sun,
departed from the Sun in order to unite Himself with earthly
evolution! — Try to picture to yourselves this stupendous
cosmic event that took place in realms beyond the Earth: it lies
within the mighty vista open to those human souls who at that time
were gathered around Michael as servants of the Angeloi, after his
rulership on Earth had ended. In the realm of the Sun they witnessed
the departure of the Christ from the Sun. “He is
departing!” ... such was their great and overwhelming
experience when He left in order to unite His destiny with the
destiny of earthly humanity.
Truly it
is not only on the Earth but in the life between death and rebirth
that the souls of human beings receive the impulse for the paths they
take. Above all was it so in the case of those who had lived through
the time of Alexander. A great and mighty impulse went forth from
that moment in cosmic history when these souls witnessed the
departure of Christ from the Sun. They saw clearly: the Cosmic
Intelligence is passing over gradually from the Cosmos to the
Earth! And Michael, together with those around him saw that all the
Intelligence once streaming through the Cosmos was now sinking down,
stage by stage, upon the Earth.
Michael
and those who belonged to
him — no matter whether they were in the
spiritual world or incarnate for a brief earthly life — were
able to visualise the rays of the Intelligence arriving, in the
eighth century of the Christian era, in the earthly realm itself. And
they knew that down upon the Earth the Intelligence would unfold and
develop further. Now, on the Earth, the appearance of the first
‘self-made’ thinkers could be observed. Hitherto, great
human beings who were ‘thinkers’ had received their
thoughts by way of Inspiration; the thoughts had been inspired into
them. Only now, from the eighth century
A.D. were there those who could be called
‘self-made’ thinkers — those who produced their own
thoughts out of themselves. And within the Archangelic host in the
realm of the Sun, the mighty proclamation rang forth from Michael:
The power belonging to my kingdom and under my administration in this
realm is here no longer; it streams downwards to the Earth and must
there surge onwards!
From the
eighth century onwards this was the spectacle of the Earth as
witnessed from the Sun. And within it was the great mystery: The
forces which are pre-eminently the forces of Michael have descended
from the Heavens and are now upon the Earth. This was the profound
secret which was known to Initiates in Schools such as those I spoke
of yesterday, for example, the renowned School of Chartres. In
earlier times, when men wished to discover the true nature of
Intelligence they had been obliged, in the Mystery Centres, to look
upwards to the Sun. Now the Intelligence was upon the Earth, though
not as yet very clearly perceptible. But gradually there was
recognition that human beings were now evolving who possessed an
individual intelligence of their own. One of those in European
civilisation in whom the first sparks of personal thinking were
alight was Johannes Scotus Erigena. I have often spoken of him. But
there had been a few others, even before him, whose thoughts were not
merely inspired, who no longer received revelations, but who could be
called self-made thinkers. And now this individual thinking became
more and more widespread.
There was
a possibility in Earth-evolution of making this self-produced
thinking serve a particular end. Consider what it represented: it was
in actuality the sum-total of those impulses from Michael's realm in
the Heavens which had found their way to the Earth. And for the time
being Michael was called upon to allow the Intelligence to unfold
without his participation. Not until the year 1879 was he to
re-assume his rulership. In the meantime, the Intelligence developed
in such a way that at the first stages he could not have exercised
his dominion. His influences could not be exerted over men who were
unfolding their own, individual thoughts. His time had not yet come.
This
profound secret of the descent of the pan-Intelligence in the
evolution of humanity was known in a few Mystery Centres over in the
East. And so, within these particular Oriental Mysteries, a few
chosen pupils could be initiated into this secret by certain deeply
spiritual, highly developed men. Through dispensations of a nature
which it is difficult for the earthly intellect to comprehend, the
illustrious Court of which I have spoken at the Goetheanum and in
other places, came into touch with this secret of which certain
Oriental Mysteries were fully cognisant. In the eighth and at the
beginning of the ninth century, under the leadership of Haroun al
Raschid, this Court wielded great power over in Asia. Haroun al
Raschid was a product of Arabian culture, a culture tinged with
Mohammedanism. The secret of which I have spoken found its way to
some of Haroun al Raschid's initiated
Counsellors — or to those who possessed at least a
certain degree of knowledge — and the brilliance of his Court
was due to the fact that it had come in touch with this secret. At
this Court were concentrated all the treasures of wisdom, of art, of
the truths of religious life to be found in the East —
coloured, of course, by Mohammedanism. In the days when, in Europe,
at the Court of Charlemagne who was a contemporary of Haroun al
Raschid, men were occupied in collating the first rudiments of
grammar and everything was still in a state of semi-barbarism, there
flourished in Baghdad that brilliant centre of Oriental, Western
Asiatic spiritual life. Haroun al Raschid gathered around him men who
were conversant with the great traditions of the Oriental Mysteries.
And he had by his side one particular Counsellor who had been an
Initiate in earlier times and whose spiritual driving forces were
still influenced by the previous incarnations. He was the organiser
of all that was cultivated at the Court of Haroun al Raschid in the
domains of geometry, chemistry, physics, music, architecture, and the
other arts — above all, a distinguished art of poetry. In this
renowned and scintillating assembly of sages, it was felt, more or
less consciously: the earthly Intelligence that has come down from
the Heavens upon the Earth must be placed in the service of
Mohammedan spiritual life!
And now
consider this: from the time of Mohammed, from the time of the early
Caliphs onwards, Arabian culture was carried from Asia across North
Africa into Europe, where it spread as the result of warlike
campaigns. But in the wake of those who by means of these campaigns
spread Arabism as far even as
Spain — France was affected by it and,
spiritually, the whole of Western Europe — there also came
outstanding personalities. The wars waged by the Frankish kings
against the Moors, against Arabism, are known to all of you ... but
that is the external aspect, that is what happens in external history
... much more important is it to know how the spiritual streams
flow on perpetually within the evolution of mankind.
Haroun al
Raschid and his wise Counsellor passed through the gate of death. But
after their life between death and rebirth they continued to pursue
their earthly aims in remarkable ways. It was their aim to introduce
Arabian modes of thinking into the European world with the help of
the rudiments of the Intelligence now spreading
in Europe. And so after Haroun al Raschid had passed through the gate
of death, while his soul was traversing spiritual, starry worlds, we
see his gaze directed unswervingly from Baghdad across Asia Minor, to
Greece, Rome, Spain, France and then northwards to England.
Throughout this life between death and rebirth his attention was
directed to the South and West of Europe. And then Haroun al Raschid
appeared again in a new incarnation — becoming Lord Bacon of
Verulam. Bacon himself is the reincarnated Haroun al Raschid who in
the intervening time between death and rebirth had worked as I have
just described.
But the
other, the one who had been his wise Counsellor, chose a different
direction — from Baghdad across the Black Sea,
through Russia and then into Middle Europe. The two individualities
took different paths and directions. Haroun al Raschid passed to his
next earthly goal as Lord Bacon of Verulam; the wise Counsellor
during his life between death and a new birth did not divert his gaze
from the sphere where influences from the East can be increasingly
potent, and he appeared again as Amos Comenius (Komenski), the great
educational reformer and author of “Pan-Sophia.” And from
the interworking of these two individualities who had once been
together at the Court in Baghdad there subsequently arose in
Europe something which unfolded — more or less at a distance
from Christianity — in the form of Arabism derived from
influences of that past time when the Intelligence had first fallen
away from Michael on the Sun.
What came
outwardly and physically to expression in wars was, as we know,
repelled by the Frankish kings and the other European peoples. We see
how the Arabian campaigns which with such a powerful initial
impetus were responsible for the spread of Mohammedan culture, were
broken and brought to a halt in the West; we see Mohammedanism
disappearing from the West of Europe. Nevertheless, divested of
the outer forms it had assumed and the external culture it had
founded, this later Arabism became modern natural science,
and also became the basis of what Amos
Comenius achieved for the world in the domain of pedagogy. And in
this way the earthly Intelligence, ‘garrisoned’ as it
were by Arabism, continued to spread right on into the seventeenth
century.
Here we
have indicated something that lies as sub-strata of the soil into
which we to-day have to sow the seeds of Anthroposophy. We must
ponder deeply over the inner and spiritual reality behind these
things.
In Europe,
while this stream was flowing over from Asia as the spiritual
continuation of that Illustrious Court
of Baghdad, Christianity was also developing and
spreading. But the spread of Aristotelianism in Europe was fraught
with great difficulties. The natural science of Aristotle had been
carried to Asia by the mighty deeds of Alexander and the impulses
flowing from Hellenistic spiritual life, but here it had been seized
upon by Arabism. In Europe, within the expanding Christian culture,
Aristotelianism was at first known in a diluted form only. Then, in
the manner which I have already indicated, Aristotelianism joined
hands with Platonism — Platonism, which was based directly upon
the ancient teachings of the Greek Mysteries.
But at the
very outset, Aristotelianism spread in Europe by slow degrees while
Platonism took the lead and prompted the establishment of schools,
one of the most important being the School of Chartres. At Chartres,
the scholars of whom I spoke
yesterday — Bernard Sylvestris, Bernard of
Chartres, John of Salisbury and, foremost among them all, Alanus ab
Insulis — were all working in the twelfth century. In this
School men spoke very differently from those whose teachings were
merely an echo of Arabism. The teachings given in the School of
Chartres were pure and genuine Christianity, illumined by the ancient
Mystery-wisdom still remaining within reach of men. And then
something of immense significance took place. The leading teachers
of Chartres, who with their Platonism had
penetrated deeply into the secrets of Christianity and who had no
part in Arabism, went through the gate of death. Then there took
place, for a brief period at the beginning of the thirteenth century,
a great ‘heavenly conference.’ And when the most
outstanding of the teachers — foremost among them Alanus ab
Insulis — had passed through death and were in the spiritual
world, they united in a momentous cosmic deed with those who at that
time were with them but who were destined in the very near future to
come into earthly existence for the purpose of cultivating
Aristotelianism in a new way. Among those preparing to descend were
individualities who had participated with deep intensity of soul in
the working of the Michael Impulse during the time of
Alexander. And at the turn of the twelfth century we may
picture, for it is in keeping with the truth, a gathering-together of
souls who had just arrived in the spiritual world from places of
Christian Initiation — of which the School of Chartres was one
— and souls who were on the point of descending to the Earth.
In the spiritual realms, these latter souls had preserved, not
Platonism, but Aristotelianism, the inner impulse of the
Intelligence deriving from the Michael Age in ancient
times. Now, in the spiritual world, the souls gathered together
... among them, too, were souls who could say: We were with Michael
and together with him we witnessed the Intelligence streaming down
from the Heavens upon the Earth; we were united with him too in the
mighty cosmopolitan Deed enacted in earlier times when the
Intelligence was still administered from the Cosmos, when he
was still the ruler and administrator of the Intelligence.
And now,
for the time being, the teachers of Chartres handed over to the
Aristotelians the administration and ordering of the affairs of the
spiritual life on Earth. Those who were now to descend and were by
nature fitted to direct the earthly, personal Intelligence, took over
the guidance of spiritual life on Earth from the Platonists, who
could work truly only when the Intelligence was being
administered “from the Heavens.”
It was
into the Dominican Order above all that those individualities in
whose souls the Michael Impulse was still echoing on from the
previous Age of Michael, found their way. And from the Dominican
Order issued that Scholasticism which wrestled through many a
bitter but glorious battle to master the true nature and operation of
the Intelligence within the human mind. Deeply rooted in the
souls of those founders of Dominican Scholasticism in the thirteenth
century was this great question: What is taking place in the domain
of Michael?
There were
men, later on known as Nominalists, who said: Concepts and ideas are
merely names, they have no reality. The Nominalists were under an
Ahrimanic influence, for their real aim was to banish Michael's
dominion from the Earth. In asserting that ideas are only names and
have no reality, their actual aim was to prevent Michael's
dominion from prevailing on Earth. And at that time the
Ahrimanic spirits whispered to those who would lend their ear:
The Cosmic Intelligence has fallen away from Michael and is here, on
the Earth: we will not allow Michael to resume his rulership over the
Intelligence! ... But in that heavenly
conference — and precisely here lies its
significance — Platonists and Aristotelians together formed a
plan for the furtherance of the Michael Impulses. — In
opposition to the Nominalists were the Realists of the Dominican
Order who maintained: Ideas and thoughts are spiritual realities
contained within the phenomena of the world, they are not
merely nominal.
If one
understands these things, one is often reminded of them in a really
remarkable way. During my last years in Vienna, one of my
acquaintances among other ordained priests was Vincenz Knauer, the
author of the work,
Hauptprobleme der Philosophie,
which I have often recommended to
Anthroposophists. In the nineteenth century he was still involved in
this conflict between Nominalism and Realism. He was trying to make
it clear that Nominalism is fallacious and he had chosen a very apt
example to illustrate his arguments. It is also given in his books.
But I remember with deep satisfaction a certain occasion when I was
walking with him along the
Wahringstrasse
in Vienna. We were speaking about Nominalism
and Realism. With all his self-controlled enthusiasm which had
something remarkable about it, something of the quality of genuine
philosophy in contrast to the philosophy of others who had more or
less lost this quality — Knauer said on that occasion: I always
make it clear to my students that the Ideas made manifest in the
things of the world have reality — and I tell them to think of
a lamb and a wolf. The Nominalists would say: A lamb is muscle, bone,
matter; a wolf is muscle, bone, matter. What receives objective
existence in lamb-flesh as the form, the idea of the lamb —
that is only a name. “Lamb” is a name there and not, as
idea, a reality. Similarly, as idea, “wolf” is not
anything real but only a name. But — Knauer went on — it
is easy to refute the Nominalists for one need only say to them: Give
a wolf nothing but lamb's flesh to eat for a time and no other food
whatever. If the idea “lamb” contains no reality, is only
a name, and if the lamb is nothing but matter, the wolf would
gradually become a lamb. But it does not do so! On the contrary, it
goes on being the reality “wolf.” In what stands there
before us as the lamb, the idea “lamb” has, as it were,
gathered the matter and brought it into the form. Similarly with the
wolf: the idea “wolf” has gathered the matter and cast it
into the form.
This was
the fundamental issue in the conflict between the Nominalists and the
Realists: the reality of what is apprehensible only by the intellect.
Thus we
see that it was the task of the Dominicans to work in advance, at the
right time, for the next Michael rulership. And whereas in accordance
with the decisions of that heavenly conference at the beginning of
the thirteenth century, the
Platonists — the teachers of Chartres, for example
— remained in the spiritual world and had no incarnations
of significance, the Aristotelians were to work at that time for the
cultivation of the Intelligence, on Earth. And from Scholasticism
— which only much later, in the modern age, was distorted,
caricatured and made Ahrimanic by Rome — from Scholasticism
there has proceeded all intellectual striving in so far as it
has kept free from the influence of Arabism.
So at that
time when these two streams of spiritual life are to be perceived in
Middle and Western Europe: on the one side, the stream with which
Bacon and Amos Comenius were connected; on the other side, the stream
of Scholasticism that was and is Christian Aristotelianism
takes its place in the evolution of
civilisation in order to prepare, as was its task, for the new Age of
Michael. When, during the rulership of the preceding
Archangels, the Schoolmen looked up into the spiritual realms they
said to themselves: Michael is yonder in the heights; his rulership
must be awaited. But some preparation must be made for the time when
he once again becomes the Regent of all that which, through the
dispensation of cosmic evolution, fell away from him in the Cosmos.
This time must be prepared for! ... And so a stream began to flow
which, though diverted into a false channel through Ultramontanism,
continued and carried with it the impulse of preparation proceeding
from the thirteenth century.
It was a
stream, therefore, whose source is Aristotelian and whose influence
worked directly on the ordering of the Intelligence that was now in
the earthly realm. With this stream is connected that of which I
spoke yesterday, saying that one who had remained a little longer
with Alanus ab Insulis in the spiritual world, came down as a
Dominican and brought a message from Alanus ab Insulis to an older
Dominican who had descended to the Earth before him.
An intense
will was present in the spiritual life of Europe to take strong hold
of the thoughts. And in realms above the Earth these happenings
led, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, to a great,
far-reaching Act in the spiritual world where that which later on was
to become Anthroposophy on the
Earth was cast into mighty Imaginations. In the first half of the
nineteenth century, and even for a short period at the end of the
eighteenth, those who had
been Platonists under the teachers of Chartres, who
were now living between death and rebirth, and those who had
established Aristotelianism on Earth and who had long ago
passed through the gate of death — all of them were united in
the heavenly realms in a great super-earthly Cult or Ritual. Through
this Act all that in the twentieth century was to be spiritually
established as the new Christianity after the beginning of the new
Michael Age in the last third of the nineteenth century — all
this was cast into mighty Imaginations.
Many drops
trickled through to the Earth. Up above, in the spiritual world, in
mighty, cosmic Imaginations, preparation was made for that
creation of the
Intelligence — an entirely spiritual creation —
which was then to come forth as Anthroposophy. What trickled through
made a very definite impression
upon Goethe, coming to him in the form, as it were, of
little reflected miniatures. The mighty pictures up above were not
within Goethe's ken; he elaborated these little miniature pictures in
his Fairy Tale of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily. Truly, it
opens up a wonderful vista! The streams I have described flow on in
such a way that they lead to those mighty Imaginations which take
shape in the spiritual world under the guidance of Alanus ab Insulis
and the others. Drops trickle through, and at the turn of the
eighteenth century Goethe is inspired to write his Fairy Tale. It
was, we might say, a first presentation of what had been cast in
mighty Imaginations in the spiritual world at the beginning of the
nineteenth, indeed by the end of the eighteenth century. In view of
this great super-sensible Cult during the first half of the nineteenth
century, it will not surprise you that my first Mystery Play,
The Portal of Initiation
— which in a certain respect aimed at giving
dramatic form to what had thus been enacted at the beginning of the
nineteenth century — became alike in outer structure to
what Goethe portrayed in his Fairy Tale. For having lived in the
super-earthly realms in Imaginative form, Anthroposophy was to come
down to the Earth. Something came to pass in the super-earthly realms
at that time. Numbers of souls who in many different epochs had been
connected with Christianity came together with souls who had
received its influences less directly. There were those who had lived
on Earth in the Age when the Mystery of Golgotha took place and also
those who had lived on Earth before it. The two groups of souls
united in order that in regions beyond the Earth, Anthroposophy might
be prepared. The individualities who, as I said, were around Alanus
ab Insulis, and those who within the Dominican stream had established
Aristotelianism in Europe, were united, too, with Brunetto
Latini, the great teacher of Dante. And in this host of souls there
were very many of those who, having again descended to the Earth, are
now coming together in the Anthroposophical Society. Those who feel
the urge to-day to unite with one another in the Anthroposophical
Society were together in super-sensible regions at the beginning of
the nineteenth century in order to participate in that mighty
Imaginative Cult of which I have spoken.
This too
is connected with the karma of the Anthroposophical Movement.
It is something that one discovers, not from any rationalistic
observation of this Anthroposophical Movement in its external,
earthly form only, but from observation of the threads that lead
upwards into the spiritual realms. Then one perceives how this
Anthroposophical Movement descends.
At the end of the eighteenth and beginning of
the nineteenth centuries it is, in very truth, the
“heavenly” Anthroposophical Movement. What Goethe
transformed into little miniature images in the Fairy Tale of the
Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily were drops that had trickled
through. But it was to come down in the real sense in the last third
of the nineteenth century, since when Michael has been striving
— but now moving downwards from the Sun to the Earth — to
take hold of the earthly Intelligence of men.
We know
that since the Mystery of Golgotha Christ has been united with the
Earth — with humanity on Earth. But, to begin
with, He was not outwardly comprehended by human beings. We have seen
also that in the age of Alexander the last phase of the rulership of
Michael over the Cosmic Intelligence was taking place. By the eighth
century A.D., the
Cosmic Intelligence had descended to the Earth. In accordance with
the agreements reached with the Platonists, those who were connected
with Michael undertook to prepare this earthly Intelligence in
Scholastic Realism in such a way that Michael would again be able to
unite with it when, in the onward flow of civilisation, he would assume
his rulership at the end of the seventies of the nineteenth century.
What
matters now is that the Anthroposophical Society shall take up this,
its inner task — this task which is: not to contest
Michael's rulership of human thinking! Here there can be no question
of fatalism. Here it can only be said that men must work together
with the Gods. Michael inspires men with his own being in order that
there may appear on the Earth a spirituality consonant with the
personal Intelligence of men, in order that men can be thinkers
— and at the same time truly spiritual. For this and this alone
is what Michael's dominion means. This is what must be wrestled for
in the Anthroposophical Movement. And then those who are working
to-day for the Anthroposophical Movement will appear again on
Earth at the end of the twentieth century and will be united with the
great teachers of Chartres. For according to the agreement
reached in that heavenly conference at the beginning of the
thirteenth century, the Aristotelians and the Platonists were to
appear together, working for the ever-growing prosperity of the
Anthroposophical Movement in the twentieth century, in order
that at the end of this century, with Platonists and Aristotelians in
unison, Anthroposophy may reach a certain culmination in earthly
civilisation. If it is possible to work in this way, in the way
predestined by Michael, then Europe and modern civilisation will
emerge from decline. But verily in no other way than this! The
leading of civilisation out of decline is bound up with an
understanding of Michael.
I
have now led you towards an understanding of
the Michael Mystery reigning over the thinking and the spiritual
strivings of mankind. This means — as you can realise —
that through Anthroposophy something must be introduced into the
spiritual evolution of the Earth, for all kinds of demonic, Ahrimanic
powers are taking possession of men. The Ahrimanic powers in many a
human body were exultant in their confidence that it would no longer
be possible for Michael to take over his rulership of the Cosmic
Intelligence which had fallen down to the Earth. And this exultation
was particularly strong in the middle of the nineteenth
century, when Ahriman already believed: Michael will not again
recover his Cosmic Intelligence which made its way from the heavens
to the Earth. And this exultation was particularly strong in the
middle of the nineteenth century, when Ahriman already believed that
Michael would not again recover his Cosmic Intelligence which made
its way from the Heavens to the Earth. Verily, great and mighty
issues are at stake! For this reason it is not to be wondered at that
those who stand in the midst of this battle have to go through many
extraordinary experiences.
Stranger
things have been said about the Anthroposophical Movement than
about any other spiritual Movement. The curious statements made
indicate in themselves that with its spirituality and its connection
with the Mystery of Golgotha, it is beyond the comprehension even of
some of the most enlightened minds of the present
day. — Does anyone ever tell you that he has
seen a man who is black and white at the same time? I hardly think
you would regard him as sane if he said such a thing to you. But
to-day people are quite capable of writing in a similar strain about
the Anthroposophical Movement. In his book,
The Great Secret
[Le Grand Secret.
Bibliothèque Charpentier,
1921. The passages concerned have been translated from the
German version of Maeterlinck's book from which
Dr. Steiner was quoting. The original French of these passages will
be found on page 182 of the present volume.],
Maurice
Maeterlinck, for example, taking me to be the pillar of the
Anthroposophical Movement, applies in regard to myself a kind of
logic entirely similar to that used by someone who claims to have
seen a man who is black and white, a European and a Moor at the same
time. Now a man can be one of the two, but certainly not both
simultaneously! Yet Maeterlinck says: “What we read in
the Vedas, says Rudolf Steiner, one of the most erudite and also one
of the most confusing among contemporary occultists ...” If
somebody were to say he had seen a man who was a European and a
Moor at the same time, he would be considered crazy; but Maeterlinck
uses the words “erudite” and “confusing” in
juxtaposition. He also says: “Rudolf Steiner who, when he does
not lose himself in visions — plausible, perhaps, but incapable
of verification — of the prehistoric ages, and in astral jargon
concerning life on other planets, is a clear and shrewd thinker who
has thrown remarkable light on the meaning of this judgement”
(he is referring to Osirification) “and of the identification
of the soul with God.” In other words, therefore: when Rudolf
Steiner is not talking about Anthroposophy, he is a clear and shrewd
thinker. Maeterlinck allows himself to say this — and other
remarkable things too, for example the following: “Steiner has
applied his intuitive methods, which amount to a kind of
transcendental psychometry, in order to reconstruct the history
of the Atlanteans and to reveal to us what takes place on the sun,
the moon and in other worlds. He describes the successive
transformations of the entities which become men, and he does so with
such assurance that we ask ourselves, having followed him with
interest through the introductions which denote an extremely
well-balanced, logical and comprehensive mind, if he has
suddenly gone mad or if we are dealing with a hoaxer or with a
genuine seer.” ... Now just think what this means. —
Maeterlinck states that when I write books, the introductions are
admittedly the product of an “extremely well-balanced, logical
and comprehensive mind.” But when he reads on he does not know
whether I have suddenly gone mad or whether I am a hoaxer or a
genuine seer. Well, after all I have not written only books! It is
always my custom to write an introduction to each book first. Very
well, then ... I write a book. Maeterlinck reads the
introduction and I seem to him to have an “extremely
well-balanced, logical and comprehensive mind.” Then he reads
on, and I turn into someone who makes him say: I don't know whether
Rudolf Steiner has suddenly gone mad or whether he is a hoaxer or a
seer. Then it happens again ... I write a second book: when he reads
the introduction Maeterlinck again accepts me as having an
“extremely well-balanced, logical and comprehensive
mind.” Then he reads the further contents and again does not
know whether I am a lunatic or a hoaxer or a seer. And so it
goes on
... But suppose everybody were to say: when I read
your books you seem, at the beginning, to be very clever, balanced
and logical, but then you suddenly go mad! People who are logical
when they begin to write and then as they write on suddenly become
crazy, must indeed be extraordinary creatures! In the next book they
switch round, are logical at the beginning and later on again
lunatics! There seems to be a rhythmical sequence ... well, after all
there are rhythms in the world!
Such
examples indicate how the most enlightened minds of the present age
receive what must be established as the Michael Epoch in the world
and what has to be done in order that the Cosmic Intelligence which
in accordance with the World-Order fell away from Michael in the
eighth century A.D., may
again be found within earthly humanity. The whole Michael tradition
must be renewed. Michael with his feet upon the Dragon — it is
right to contemplate this picture which portrays Michael the Warrior,
defending the Cosmic Spirit against the Ahrimanic Powers under his
feet.
This
battle, more than any other, is laid in the human
heart. There, within the hearts of men, it is and has
been waged since the last third of the nineteenth century. Decisive
indeed will be what human hearts do with this Michael Impulse in the
world in the course of the twentieth century. And in the course of
the twentieth century, when the first century after the end of
Kaliyuga has elapsed, humanity will either stand at the grave of all
civilisation — or at the beginning of that Age when in the
souls of men who in their hearts ally Intelligence with Spirituality,
Michael's battle will be fought out to victory.
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