VIII
The Effect of Absinthe — Hemophilia — The Ice
Age — The Declining Oriental and the Rising European
Cultures — On Bees
Dr. Steiner: Good morning, gentlemen! Have you thought
of something to ask me since the last time?
More detailed questions are raised concerning the effect of
absinthe and also concerning bees and wasps.
Dr. Steiner: Well, we have already discussed the
question of the effect of absinthe, which, as I told you, is
similar to the general effect of alcohol. If we are to go
further into these questions, I would like to say something
about some broader influences on the human body. We must be
clear that we cannot speak only about the solid components of
the human organism, of the human body, since they amount to at
most ten to twelve percent of the whole. When we find the human
body sketched in a book, the sketch can, of course, only be
made by outlining the solid components. So it is believed that
man consists only of his brain, lungs, heart, and so on, that
is, that he is really composed only of such solid components.
As I have told you, however, the human body is approximately
eighty-five percent fluid, a watery fluid.
It
is therefore only partially correct to say that we drink water,
for example, and the water, along with a number of dissolved
substances, enters the stomach and from there the intestines,
and so forth. This is only partly true. When a small glass of
water is drunk, we can picture what I just said to be the case.
With the second glass of water, however, what is in the water
is absorbed by the body's fluid elements and does not pass
first through all the organs in the way I described.
Now, it is a fact that the solid components in man are least
exposed to the entire surroundings. Naturally, when the heart,
for example, is observed, it expands and contracts with the
pulse beats, but as a whole it retains the same size and
remains as it is. If we consider that we are filled with
fluids, we recognize that these fluids are open to any number
of influences from the outside world. Even a small amount of
fluid assumes the shape of a drop, since the world is round and
affects each individual drop. Because we are fluid, the whole
world affects us, and because modern science no longer takes
into consideration the fact that man is really a column of
fluid, it has simply forgotten that the whole world with all
its stars has this influence on the human being.
When one recognizes that man is a mixture of fluids, one is not
too far from realizing that he is air as well. I constantly
draw in the air and then exhale it again; hence, I am also air.
Owing to the constant motion of air within myself, I am truly a
human being. It is only due to man's being composed in this way
that it is possible for man really to be a soul-spiritual
being. If we were only solid, we really could not be
soul-spiritual beings at all.
Now, everything exerts a specific influence on the human being.
We have already mentioned various poisons, and you will no
doubt have heard of so-called lead poisoning. When too much
lead is introduced into a person's body — such an
overdose need only be a small amount, which, however, may be
proportionately too much for the body — he becomes too
hard. Then these solid components become calcareous, as it
were. When man introduces a minute amount of lead into the body
— and in lead poisoning it only takes a minute amount
— the body becomes too solid. If one sees that a person
is beginning to become too solid-man even ages due to lead
poisoning, hence signs of aging are noted — then silver
in some form must be given as a remedy. That will make man
fluid again so that he can experience the effects of outer
influences. Lead poisoning, therefore, can be counteracted by
silver compounds, which must be chosen to fit the specific
case. All manner of things thus have an effect on the human
being.
As
you know, the feminine and masculine natures differ greatly
from one another. The feminine nature contains more of the
fluid element, as it were, so one can say that the feminine
nature is more susceptible to outer influences, because it is
more fluid. The masculine nature is less open to outer
influences, because it places more weight on man's solid
element. One can therefore say that certain illnesses, like
lead poisoning, can be more readily controlled in the feminine
nature with the administration of less silver, whereas more
silver must be prescribed for the masculine nature, because
that constitution is not readily made fluid. You see, one must
put great weight on everything in the human being, because only
in this way is a true understanding of him reached. You see,
every substance has a profound influence on the human
being.
All
this is connected in turn with that relationship of the
masculine and feminine that is expressed in hereditary
conditions. These hereditary conditions are extraordinarily
complicated. You can see how complicated these hereditary
conditions are in hemophilia; the blood in those afflicted with
this illness doesn't coagulate immediately. In a normal person,
the blood within the body coagulates immediately, as soon as it
is exposed on the surface. The blood is liquid within the body;
as soon as it reaches the surface it becomes compact, solid, it
coagulates. In hemophiliacs, or bleeders as they are sometimes
called, the blood does not coagulate immediately. It flows
readily even from a small wound and sometimes even ruptures the
skin. It is difficult to perform operations on bleeders.
Whereas in normal people the blood immediately begins to
coagulate as soon as an incision is made, with bleeders it
pours out. Whereas as with others the blood becomes hard
immediately, with hemophiliacs it remains fluid so that they
can easily bleed to death during an operation, making such an
undertaking extraordinarily difficult. Hemophiliacs are forever
subject to hemorrhage.
Now, it is very strange that a man who is a hemophiliac can
marry a woman who is not, and they will have healthy children
without hemophilia. If they have sons, the hereditary
conditions will not exhibit any detrimental effects in them.
Should they have a daughter, however, she herself will not be a
hemophiliac, but if she should marry even a perfectly healthy
man they might have children who would be hemophiliacs. The odd
thing about this affliction is that it doesn't surface in the
feminine sex; the daughters don't get hemophilia, but the
children of these daughters do, even if their fathers are
completely healthy. Hence, hemophilia passes to the descendants
by way of the woman, without the woman getting it herself.
Here we see the complicated ways in which the conditions in the
human body become mixed with hereditary conditions. It is
therefore the greatest risk for the daughter of a hemophiliac
to marry, because hemophilia will then pass on to some of her
children even if she is completely healthy. This shows you how
important it is to take such conditions into consideration.
Now, such problems could be coped with if medicine were placed
on a sound basis. What measures would it be proper to take with
the daughter of a hemophiliac? Before she has any children,
some remedy containing lead can be given prophylactically, as
it is called in medicine. The husband should also receive this
lead-containing medication. Then the children will be protected
from getting hemophilia.
Naturally, if medical thinking is so muddled that one takes the
stand of waiting until a person exhibits the symptoms of the
illness before beginning a cure, then this will do no good.
Medicine must develop a social conscience. It must change so
that steps are taken to prevent threatening illnesses from
occurring. This cannot be done, of course, as long as today's
conceptions prevail. Naturally, people do not seek a cure for
an illness that they do not as yet have but could contract due
to hereditary conditions. It is especially important in
pregnancy to administer a lead remedy if there is any
possibility at all of hemophilia.
All
this cannot be understood if one does not know that only the
solid body of man is really physical and material. Only that
portion is material. As soon as one comes to the fluid element,
one finds a much more delicate substance at work. Since time
immemorial this delicate substance has been called
“ether.” Ether is present everywhere. It is more
delicate than all other substances — more delicate than
water, air, and even warmth. As little as ether can penetrate
the solid components of the human being, however, the more
active it is in his fluid element. Just as man possesses the
ether in his fluid element, so he has the actual soul element
in the aeriform. He has the actual soul element in the air he
carries within him. When this is understood, that in the air
one has the soul element, it becomes clear that man exhales the
soul element with each breath, and with each inhalation he
takes it into himself again. He really lives with the universe
by means of this soul element, but because no consideration is
given by modern science to the fact that he also possesses an
aeriform organism, people lose sight altogether of the soul
element and even believe it doesn't exist.
The
soul element must be considered entirely by itself. Then, the
effects of fluid substances, such as absinthe, can be
discerned. You see, when I take a drink of absinthe, it is, of
course, liquid at first and then it merges with the large
quantity of the body's fluids. How does absinthe deal with
these fluids, however? It makes these fluids rebellious against
absorbing the aeriform in the right way. So, when I take
absinthe into the body, the aeriform element can no longer
penetrate all my parts in the right way. At the same time,
something else happens. When I prevent the aeriform element
from penetrating all the parts of my body, this aeriform
element reacts in a most peculiar way. I will make clear to you
how this aeriform element works by making a comparison.
Imagine, for example, a person who is employed in an office and
works hard from morning till night. He goes in in the morning
and he goes home in the evening. His co-workers say of him that
he is simply somebody who comes and goes along with them. Now
imagine another person who also works in the office, but this
fellow is a clown. He doesn't work much but plays around with
everybody from morning till night. He is quite popular with all
the employees, who think of him as one of them and are always
glad to see him. Of course, his superiors are not so overjoyed
with him because the work suffers, but his colleagues enjoy his
clowning.
Similarly, this is what happens when we block out the air with
absinthe. It then rolls around the organs instead of properly
penetrating them and filling the body. It remains distinct,
stopping here, there, and everywhere. It is just like the funny
fellow in the office. It causes pleasant feelings everywhere
because it needn't do too much work. If the air is to penetrate
the fluids correctly, it has work to do; otherwise, it doesn't
supply the body correctly. When absinthe blocks out the air,
however, it rolls around everywhere, and the person gradually
comes to feel as jolly as a pig. A peculiarity of pigs is that
they constantly fill themselves with air that is not properly
absorbed. The pig is easily made short of breath.
Just as the ether is present everywhere in the fluid
substances, so the soul element is present everywhere in the
air; we also call it the astral element, because it is called
forth by the influence of the stars. Man absorbs the soul
element everywhere and feels a pleasant warmth or coolness in
himself. Now when the air is rolling around in him, he feels
good through and through. The soul element in the body is not
there, however, merely for the purpose of serving man's
pleasure. It is supposed to work on the organs in the right way
so that the heart and all the other organs are correctly cared
for. If instead, however, man blocks the soul element so that
it amuses him in his body, then, although he feels
“piggishly well,” [“sauwohl”]
his organs are not cared for in the right way. In particular,
those organs are shortchanged that contribute most to his
having healthy offspring. Here we have a strange phenomenon.
People who care for themselves with absinthe actually strive to
feel “piggishly well” within, to have this feeling
of sensual pleasure inside, but in doing so, they do not
provide humanity with healthy descendants. This is the
objection to absinthe.
Now
you can also ask why the desire to drink absinthe actually
arises in people in the first place. If you study the history
of humanity, you will note that such vices occur most often in
those whose development is declining and who are no longer in
the full prime of life, that is, those whose bodies are
inwardly already somewhat disintegrated. Then people let
themselves be amused inwardly by the soul element. This is
particularly the case in nations that are in a process of
decline. In earlier times, when the Asians and Orientals were
still on the ascent, they abhorred all this drinking. They only
began to do things such as drink absinthe when they had already
begun to decline.
This is also the case when we note what goes on today in
instances in which these vices get out of hand, when people
want to introduce all possible substances into the body. People
even seek these effects with cocaine, as I told you recently.
With cocaine, the soul element has the effect of pressing the
body out, and I have described how such addicts experience
something like snakes emerging everywhere from their bodies.
The reason a person uses these poisons in this way is because
the whole human being is no longer healthy, and he would like
to enjoy the soul element as much as possible. In the decadent
nations, those people who have the least to do are those who
will seek this sensual experience of the body. This is
connected with all the historical processes of the human
race.
It
is strange how, if we go west, people permit themselves to be
enslaved, as it were, by proclaiming all kinds of laws against
alcohol, absinthe, and the like. Even so, people try in any
number of ways to get their hands on these sub stances. This
demonstrates that today we stand amidst the greatest confusion
in human life. on-the one hand, human beings want to live
indulgently; on the other, as nations, they do not want to
deteriorate completely. This lack of in sight is the cause of
the really insane muddle created by the craving of individuals
to subject their bodies to all kinds of substances and then
again, the laws created to prohibit them from doing so. People
need to gain some insight again.
I
have explained before that the feminine is connected more with
the influences of the universe, whereas the masculine closes
itself off from these influences. When men become addicted to
absinthe, therefore, they ruin those organs that normally
produce offspring who would become people of inwardly firm and
strong character. Absinthe will cause people to become
weaklings. So, if absinthe is increasingly drunk by men, their
children will turn out to be weaklings; they will become a weak
race, they will have weak descendants. The males will become
effeminate. If women become addicted to absinthe, things will
reach a point where children will be born who will be extremely
susceptible to all kinds of disease.
Such matters must be viewed in relation to the whole world. I
would like to tell you something extraordinarily interesting.
You can ask from whence much of what we know today is really
derived. No attention is ordinarily paid to how much wisdom
humanity possesses in the most simple, everyday aspects of
life. As you know, we name the days of the week: Sunday after
the sun; Monday after the moon; Tuesday after Mars —
mardi in French is definitely named after Mars. While
in German Wednesday
[Note by translator: The English Wednesday is
derived from Wotan's Day; Wotan is the Germanic name for the
being called Mercury in Latin.]
is Mittwoch, or mid-week, you only have to take the French
mercredi and you have Mercury Day, after the planet
Mercury. Thursday is after Thor, the thunderer, in German
Donnerstag from Donor, but Donor (Thor) is none other
than Jupiter. In French we still have jeudi, Jupiter
Day. Friday is named after the German goddess Freia, who is the
same as Venus; this is vendredi in French.
[ Mention of Saturday was omitted by Rudolf
Steiner. It is especially obvious in English that the day is
named after Saturn.]
Hence, the days of the week are
named after the planets. Why is that? Because these names
originated in a time when it was still known that man is
dependent on the universe. Because man lives, all the planets
have an influence on him. The days of the week were named
accordingly. Today this is called superstition, but calling it
superstition is nothing but ignorance. Actually, tremendous
wisdom is contained in the naming of the days of the week. Yes,
gentlemen, in all these matters there lies a tremendous
wisdom!
Now, if we ask from whence this naming of the days of the week
came, we go to Asia and find that two or three thousand years
before the birth of Christ, extraordinarily clever people lived
there. Among the Babylonians and Assyrians were very clever
people who were able to observe the influence of the stars;
they were the first to name the days of the week. Others than
translated them into their own languages. We owe the names of
the days of the week to the East, to the Babylonians and the
Assyrians, where people were already clever, extremely clever,
at a time when Europe looked entirely different. Let us ask
what Europe was like around four thousand years ago in Asia, in
Assyria and Babylonia, when there were people who really were
much cleverer than we are. They were cleverer because they
possessed a much greater wealth of knowledge. It is not true
that humanity merely progresses smoothly forward. From time to
time, humanity also takes steps backward.
Now, these people had a great wealth of knowledge. If people
simply abandon their souls to such knowledge, however, it does
not agree with them any more than money does. As funny as this
comparison might sound, it is true. Too much money does people
no good; neither does too much knowledge, if it is not
counterbalanced by correctly employing it in the service of
humanity and the world. The Asians had gradually accumulated a
tremendous knowledge, but they didn't know what to do with
it.
What Europe was like at that time, when the Asians still
possessed such great knowledge, can best be seen here in these
regions of Switzerland, for example. If you look at the rocks
that have been brought down into the valleys by glaciers, you
can tell from the appearance of these rocks that the glaciers
have worked on them. These are glacial rocks. We can tell from
their appearance that they have come down from the heights and
that the flowing ice of the glaciers has affected them. From
the way all the rocks around here look, we know that this whole
region was once covered with ice. Indeed, the very ground we
walk and feel most comfortable on was once covered with
glaciers.
Again, if we go further north in Prussia and large parts of
Germany, one can tell by the forms of certain rocks that all
those areas were covered with glacial ice that flowed down from
the far north. Just as the glaciers descend today to a certain
level, so the glaciers moved from the far northern regions all
the way into Germany, covering everything with ice.
Not
so long ago, people had a special preference for large numbers,
and so they said, “Oh, certainly Europe was once covered
with glaciers, but that was twenty or thirty million years
ago.” This is nonsense. It came about through a
calculation that I shall illustrate for you with the following
example.
Imagine that I observe a human heart today. This human heart
constantly undergoes minute changes. If I observe it a year
hence, it will have become a little less resilient, still less
in two years, and I can now calculate how much less resilient
it has become. Now, by adding it all up, I can calculate how
much less resilient the heart will be in a hundred years and
from this know also what it was like a century ago. I can
certainly figure that out. I can take, say, a seven-year-old
person; three hundred years ago, his heart was in such and such
shape. There is only the one small matter of his not having
been alive then. Similarly, if I figure out how his heart will
have changed three hundred years hence, there again is that
small matter of his not being alive then.
Such calculations have been made in order to figure out how it
looked here in Europe, for example, twenty to thirty thousand
years ago. The glacial period thus was pushed far back, but one
cannot calculate like that. One must have a science that can
show regarding the earth what one already knows regarding the
human being, that in three hundred years he will no longer be
living as a physical, earthly being.
In
recent years the learned scientists have become more
reasonable, and those with reason have realized that it was not
so long ago that everything here was covered with glaciers; in
fact, all of Europe was still iced over when people in Asia
were as clever as I have described when the Babylonian and
Assyrian cultures flourished. We need only go back a few
thousand years — four or five thousand — to find
that in Europe everything was still iced over. Only gradually,
as the ice diminished, did human beings migrate here.
Well, these people did not have it as easy as people today. It
was much harder on them, since they came from warmer regions
where they were not constantly subjected to the cold and where
they really fared better. Nevertheless, these people did move
into regions that only recently had been covered with ice.
Through this they were prevented from experiencing the sensual
pleasure of wisdom that would gradually have been theirs in
Asia. Because an influence was exerted on Europe from the
universe, causing it to be covered with ice when the Asian
culture enjoyed a warm climate, a better, more energetic
culture developed in Europe than could have evolved in Asia.
You see, entire civilizations depend on influences from the
universe.
Moreover, when one thinks of a glass of ocean water, one sees
it simply as water to which a little salt was added: sea water
is salty, so when I add salt to plain water I get sea water. It
is not as simple as that, however, if you look at the ocean
— the Atlantic, for instance — if you could look at
it from beneath the surface — here's the surface
(sketching) and here's the water — then this is not
merely salt water; a curious phenomenon would be observed. When
summer comes, something reminiscent of falling snow would pass
through the sea. Looking at this gigantic expanse of the ocean
from below the surface, one would not say that it was just
filled with sea water; indeed, one would see it snowing, as it
were. What causes this? The sea contains countless minute
creatures, all possessing tiny calcareous shells. These
creatures are called foraminifera. As long as these creatures
are alive, they swim around in the water fairly close to the
surface. Now, when the time of year approaches in which they
can no longer live, these creatures die, and their shells begin
to sink. These shells are constantly falling, and it is truly
like a snow storm. It is really like snow in the air. The
entire ocean experiences a snowfall made by these foraminifera.
When these foraminifera shells are finally deposited here on
the bottom (sketching), their substance is altered and they
turn into red clay. This is the ocean floor. These little
creatures receive their life from the universe and then build
up the ocean floor. It is exactly the same with us in this part
of the world. We don't live in the ocean, we live in the air.
And when it snows in winter, what is in the snow is what makes
our ground as it is, for if there weren't the right snowfall,
the plants couldn't grow. The ground is made by what is in the
snow.
Gentlemen, it is not the solid components nor even the fluid
components in our bodies that absorb the right influences, but
only the aeriform components. This influence is absorbed by our
breathing when it snows in winter. What the world of the stars
sends down to us when it snows in winter, we absorb into
ourselves and mold in the right way. To do this, however, our
souls need to work in the right way on our organs; otherwise
our organs atrophy. Now, when we load down our bodies with
absinthe, we close ourselves off from the starry world. We can
no longer absorb the influences of the starry world. The result
is that we ruin our bodies by thus exposing them only to the
earth's influence. You can see how tremendously significant it
is, if we are to bring about the right kind of human evolution,
that we not ruin our bodies with absinthe. We must realize
that!
Now, you can easily picture how civilization progressed. In
Asia there existed tremendously clever people who possessed
strong soul natures. Gradually, however, they wanted to
experience the soul element only as an inner coloring, an inner
sensual feeling. Some of them migrated into the regions that
earlier had been covered with ice. There they weaned themselves
away from this inner sensual feeling and again strengthened
their bodies. This is how the civilization of the Occident was
added to that of the Orient. Even today, you can see from the
glacial formations here on the mountain tops that the earth was
once thoroughly cooled in this region, through which the people
who moved here were thus able to strengthen their bodies.
You
also find the reasons for the decline of the Roman Empire in
these things. This dates back to the age when Christianity was
first beginning to spread. Yes, gentlemen, if Christianity had
spread only among the Romans, the result would have been pretty
bad! The Romans, who possessed only the remnants of the
Oriental, Asian culture, had become so effeminate that they
could not accomplish anything. Then, the peoples of the
northern, ice-covered regions arrived with their more sturdy
bodies, and the Roman Empire consequently perished. These
northern people with their more sturdy bodies then took over
the spiritual life.
History describes this as the barbarian invasions in which the
Romans perished when the Germanic tribes arrived. These are
really today's Europeans — the Germans, French, and
English — because they are all basically Germanic
peoples. The French have only absorbed a little more of the
Roman element than the Germans, for example. All this is based
on the fact that these people came from regions where they
could absorb the influences of the universe, whereas the other
people with their wisdom lived only on the earth. These people
that came from the north renewed the whole civilization. So you
see, this is how nature is related to everything that takes
place in history.
You
also know, however, what a strong influence the Roman element
still retained. Remember, for example, that not a word of
German could be spoken in the universities of Central Europe
until the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The professors
lectured in Latin. Of course, it had gradually become an odd
form of Latin, but everybody knew and understood Latin.
Lecturing in the native language came about only slowly, but
this tendency to hold on to what was declining because one felt
more comfortable with it, even with the speech, continued for a
long time.
Just think how long people who wished to give themselves airs
chattered in French in all the German regions. This was for no
other reason than that they wished to perpetuate the old
Latin-Roman element, at least in the language. It is true that
what continued on in the language was also perpetuated in other
vices. The Romans began this craving to experience a sensual
feeling within the body, to enjoy the soul element rather than
to make use of it to build up the body. The legacy of this is
still present in the craving to drink absinthe, indeed, even to
enjoy cocaine and so on. These things will produce a weak race,
weak descendants, and will gradually lead those who succumb to
such vices to decline. You can enact all the social reforms you
like; nothing will result from these social reforms if true
insight is not achieved. Such insight can come about only when
the materialism in science and religion is replaced by
beginning to grasp something spiritual. When human beings begin
to grasp the spiritual, they will perceive much of what is not
only quite clear outwardly but that can then be penetrated if
the spiritual can be contemplated in the right way.
The
question of one of you gentlemen, who is an expert on bees,
pointed to the distinction between the lives of bees and the
lives of wasps. There is much that is similar. I recently
described to you the life of wasps, and it is quite similar to
that of the bees. The life of the beehive, however, is a
remarkably strange one. What is its basis? You see, you cannot
explain this if you don't have the possibility of looking into
it spiritually. The life in a beehive is extraordinarily wise
in its arrangement. Anybody who has observed the bees' life
would agree to that. Naturally, one cannot say that bees have a
science such as humans have, because they have nothing
approaching the brain apparatus that man has. Bees thus cannot
assimilate the overall universal wisdom into their bodies as
human beings do, but the influences from the universal
surroundings of the earth work powerfully on beehives. If all
that lives in the surroundings of the earth, which has a very
strong influence on the beehive, were taken into consideration,
one could arrive at a correct comprehension of what the life of
the bees is really like. Much more so than among ants and
wasps, life in the beehive is based on the bees' cooperating
with each other and accomplishing their tasks harmoniously. To
figure out what causes this, one must conclude that bees have a
life in which the element that expresses itself in other
animals in their sexual life is suppressed to an extraordinary
degree. In bees this impulse is extraordinarily suppressed.
You
see, reproduction is actually taken care of among bees by a few
select females, the queen bees. The sexual life of the others
is really more or less suppressed. In sexual life, however,
there is also the life of love. The life of love is an element
of the soul. Only because certain organs in the body are
affected by this soul element do they reveal and become
expressions of this love life. Inasmuch as the love life is
suppressed in bees and concentrated in only one queen bee, what
would otherwise be sexual life in the beehive is transferred to
the other activities that the bees develop. This is why the
wise men of old, who knew of these matters in a way differing
from that of today, associated this whole wondrous bustle of
the beehive with the love life that is connected with the
planet Venus.
So
we can say that when one describes the wasps or the ants, they
are creatures that withhold themselves from the influence of
the planet Venus. The bees are completely given up to the
influence of the planet Venus, developing a love life
throughout their entire hive. It therefore becomes a wise life,
and you can imagine how wise that must be. I have described
something of the way successive generations of bees are
produced. It contains an unconscious wisdom. This unconscious
wisdom the bees develop in their outer activity. Therefore, the
element that arises in us only when our hearts love can
actually be found throughout the beehive as a substance. The
entire beehive is actually permeated by a life of love. In most
instances the individual bees renounce love and develop the
love in the entire beehive. One can begin to understand their
life when one becomes clear that the bees live as if in an
atmosphere that is pervaded through and through with love.
It
is most beneficial to the bee that it sustains itself actually
by those parts of the plant that are completely permeated by
the plant's love life. The bee sucks its nourishment, which it
then turns into honey, out of those parts of the plant that are
integral aspects of its love life. The bee thus carries the
love life of the flowers into the hive. This is why the life of
the bee must be studied from the standpoint of the soul.
This is much less necessary with ants and wasps. When their
lives are traced, one will see that, instead of what I have
described for bees, they tend to have more of a sex life. With
the exception of the queen bee, the bee is really the one being
that, in a manner of speaking, says, “We shall renounce
an individual sex life and instead become bearers of the life
of love.” They have indeed carried into their
accomplishments in the hive what lives in flowers. If you
really begin to think this through, you uncover the entire
mystery of the beehive. The life of this sprouting, thriving
love that is spread out over the flowers is then also contained
in the honey.
You
can investigate this further and ask what effect honey has on
you when you eat it. What does honey do? Well, absinthe unites
with the fluidity of man, driving out the air and with it the
soul element, so that man experiences sensual pleasure. Honey
generates sensual pleasure on the tongue. The moment the honey
is eaten, it furthers the right relationship between the air
element and the fluid element in man. Nothing is better for the
human being than to add the right amount of honey to his food.
In a marvelous way, the bee really sees to it that man learns
to work on his organs with his soul element. By means of honey,
the beehive gives back to man what he needs for energy of soul
in his body. When man drinks quantities of absinthe, he wishes
to enjoy his soul. When man adds honey to his meal, he prepares
his soul element in such a way that it works and breathes
properly in his body. Beekeeping is therefore something that
really contributes significantly to civilization, because it
makes man strong, whereas to indulge in absinthe is something
that will gradually drive the human race to extinction.
When you consider that bees receive the greatest influence from
the world of the stars, you realize that through the bees the
right element can enter the human being. All living things work
together in the right way when they are combined in the right
way. When a person looks at a beehive, he should say to himself
with something akin to exaltation that, by way of the beehive,
the whole universe draws into human beings and makes them
capable people. Drinking absinthe, however, produces incapable
human beings. The knowledge of man thus becomes knowledge of
the universe.
|