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Rudolf Steiner e.Lib
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The Mission of the Archangel Michael
Rudolf Steiner e.Lib Document
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The Mission of the Archangel Michael
Schmidt Number: S-3910
On-line since: 23rd November, 2003
The Michael Revelation. The Word Becomes Flesh and the Flesh Becomes Spirit
I HAVE spoken in the previous lecture of the error which has entered
our modern spiritual life and which is very little noticed today. You
will have realized from our discussions that by pointing to this error
we have arrived at a very important point in our spiritual-scientific
considerations. It is imperative for a sound development of the
spiritual life of mankind that there be clarity in this matter. I have
drawn your attention to such products of culture as Milton's
Paradise Lost or Klopstock's Messiah, which have sprung
from the general popular thinking of the last few centuries. But I
have also drawn your attention to the fact that just through such
artistically as well as spiritually outstanding products of culture we
can see the dangers that are facing man's soul life if he fails to
realize that it is impossible to arrive at a true and adequate concept
of spirit, a true concept of Christ, as long as he imagines that the
structure of the world and the spirit can be grasped through the
symbol of the duad. By differentiating only according to the duad
— on the one hand the good, on the other the evil — people
committed the error of including on the side of evil all that we
designate as the Luciferic and the Ahrimanic element. But they did not
realize that they had jumbled up two cosmic elements. Thus it has come
about that the Luciferic element was shifted to the side of the Good;
in other words, people were of the opinion that they revered the
Divine, recognized the Divine, spoke by name of the Divine, whereas,
in reality, they intermixed the Luciferic with the Divine element.
Hence the difficulty in our time of arriving at a pure concept of the
Divine and a pure concept of the Christ impulse in human and world
evolution. Through the culture of the centuries we have become
accustomed, because of the acknowledgment of this duad, to speak, on
the one hand, of the soul element, on the other, of the bodily or
corporeal element, and we have lost the connection between the
thoughts which relate us to the soul-spiritual element and the
thoughts which relate us to the bodily element. Thinking, willing,
feeling are little more than sounding words to people of the present
day; and this is particularly true of modern psychology that is taught
in our universities. It does not arrive at real inner conceptions of
the soul element, filled with content. On the other hand, people speak
of the de-spiritualized material element, devoid of soul, and they
hammer, as it were, at this external, rigid, stony-hard, soulless
material element and are unable to build a bridge from it to the soul.
The all-pervading spiritual and the corporeal which is at the same
time spiritual have fallen apart into two elements. Mere theories will
not build a bridge between the bodily and the spiritual. And since
this is not possible, all scientific thinking has taken on the
character of a schism between the bodily and the spirit or soul
element. We might express it thus: on the one hand, the various creeds
have resorted to pointing to the spiritual element without being in a
position to show how this spiritual element takes hold of the
bodily-corporeal element; on the other hand, a soulless knowledge, a
soulless observation of the body is unable to look through the bodily
processes and perceive the spirit-soul element governing them. Anyone
who surveys from this point of view the natural-scientific world
conception as it developed in the course of the nineteenth century and
into the twentieth century will have to say to himself: all that
pertains to this world conception is a result of that which has just
been characterized. In order to understand fully the illusion which
today covers up reality, we must first establish this reality. This we
shall be able to do as a result of much that has been discussed here
at length. Today the human being is considered a single undivided
being, regardless whether we are speaking of soul or of body. From the
soul aspect he is considered a uniform being; from the bodily aspect
he is considered a uniform being. Yet you will have gathered from our
discussions that in man there exists, above everything else, the great
contrast between the head formation and the rest of the human
organism. This latter part of the human body could be further divided,
but for the moment let us consider it as a unity. If we make inquiry
into the evolution of man, the inquiry in regard to the head formation
must be different from that in regard to the rest of the body.
If we focus our attention upon the head formation, from a purely
bodily aspect, in as far as this head formation contains the organism
for sense perception or for thinking, we have to look far back into
the cosmic evolution of man. What finds its expression today in the
human head formation has been gradually developed and transformed. Its
development has gone on through ancient Saturn, Sun and
Moon and has continued during the Earth evolution. But
this is not the case with the rest of the human body. It would be
entirely wrong to look for a uniform evolutionary history of the whole
human being. We may say (Dr. Steiner draws a diagram): The head
formation points back to the previous planetary stages of our
Earth: Moon, Sun, Saturn evolution; the development which has
found its conclusion in the human head reaches far back. But if we add
to this all that belongs to the rest of man, we need not go back as
far as the Saturn evolution. The chest formation may be traced
back as far the Moon evolution; the limbs have been added to
the human being only during the Earth evolution.
We consider the human being in the right way only if we make the
following comparative observation. But please, take it only as a
comparison.
You can easily imagine, hypothetically, that through some sort of
organic conditions in the cosmos, through some conditions of
adaptation connected with conditions of inner growth, the human being
might put forth new limbs. You would not then trace back the entire
human form to a previous evolution, but you would say: Man, as an
evolving being, has to be traced back; but this or that limb has only
been added at a certain point of time. The reason for our being
tempted not to think in this way in regard to the head and the rest of
the human organism is that with respect to the outer spatial size of
man the rest of the human organism is larger than the head. The truth,
however, is that the head formation reaches furthest back in
evolution, while the rest of the human form was added later. If we
wish to speak of a connection of man with the animal world in regard
to evolution, we can only say: The human head can be traced back to an
earlier animal formation. The human head is a transformed animal
shape, a greatly transformed animal shape.
At a time when animals did not yet exist, the human being, under
completely different physical conditions, had an animal form. Animals
have developed only later. That part of the human being, however, that
had an animal form has become what is today the human head, and that
which has been added to the head as the rest of the human organism has
been added at a time when the simultaneous development of the animals
occurred. Thus it has nothing to do with an actual descent from the
animal. We must really state the following: The seemingly most noble
part of the human being, his head, points us back to the animal; in
regard to the head the human being himself had formerly a kind of
animal form. But the rest of our organism we received as an organic
addition to the head at a time of cosmic evolution in which the
parallel development of the animals took place.
In a certain respect our head has become our organ of thinking. Our
organ of thinking is that part of us which, if we may use the
expression, has animal descent; a strange animal descent, to be sure.
If you look at a human head today, you will not at once discover
anatomically the traits that point back to the animal form. Yet upon
closer investigation and with the proper interpretation of the forms
of the head organs you will recognize them as transformed animal
organs.
In considering all this, we must at the same time mention that the
transformation of the head from the animal form to the human form came
about through the fact that the human head had already entered a
retrogressive evolution. That which in earlier states of evolution was
full of vitality and life is, in the human head, already in the
process of dying. I once stated the following: If we human beings were
only head, we could never live, we would be continuously dying, for
the organic processes that take place in the head through the forces
of the head itself are not life processes but death processes. The
human head is continually quickened to life by the rest of the
organism. The head owes to the rest of the organism its participation
in the general life of the organism. If the head were simply to rely
upon those forces for which it is organized, namely the forces of
sense perception and thinking, it would be continually dying. Its
continuous tendency is to die; it has to be constantly revitalized. If
we think, if we perceive with our senses, there takes place in our
head, in our nervous system and its connection with the sense organs,
a process that is the opposite of an ascending process of life and
growth. For if such a life process took place there, we would fall into
deep sleep, we would never be able to think clearly. Only through the
fact that death constantly pervades our head, that a continuous
retrogressive evolution is going on there and the organic processes
are constantly cancelled, do thinking and sense perception take place
in our head.
Whoever in a materialistic fashion attempts to explain thinking and
sense perception by means of the brain processes does not know at all
what processes occur in the head; he believes the processes occurring
there may be compared with the processes of organic growth. This is
not the case. The processes that run parallel to sense perception and
thinking are breaking down processes, processes of destruction. The
organic, the material, must first be broken down, must first be
destroyed; then above the organic process of destruction the thinking
process arises.
You see, these matters are conceived of by humanity today in such a
way that the attempt is made to explain their nature externally. The
human being thinks, he perceives with his senses; but he knows nothing
about that which takes place simultaneously in his organism; this
remains completely in the unconscious. Only through the processes
which I have described in my book, Knowledge of the Higher Worlds
and Its Attainment {Anthroposophic Press, New York,) is it
possible gradually to rise to a knowledge which does not merely live
in what today is called, in a mere word-sense, the soul element,
namely sense perception and thinking. If a soul undergoes the
development described in my book, it can yield on the one hand to
thinking, to sense perception, and simultaneously perceive what
happens in the brain; it then does not perceive a growth process but a
breaking down process which has continually to be compensated by the
rest of the organism.
You see, this is the tragic phenomenon accompanying a real knowledge
of the activity of the head: there is no unfolding of organic
processes in the head to be enjoyed by the clairvoyant when he thinks,
when he perceives with his senses; on the contrary, he has to
familiarize himself with a process of destruction. He must also
familiarize himself with the fact that the materialistically inclined
person supposes such processes to take place in the human head which
cannot possibly take place when man thinks or perceives with his
senses. Materialism must suppose just the opposite of the truth.
Thus, in the human head we are concerned with an evolution out of the
animal, but with an evolution already retrogressive; with a breaking
down process. The rest of our human organism is in a progressive
evolution, and we must not believe that it has no part in the
soul-spiritual element and its experience in man. Not only is our
blood constantly sent up from the rest of the organism into the head,
but also there continually rise into the head those soul-spiritual
thought forms from which the world and our organism are woven. These
soul-spiritual thought forms are not yet perceived by the human being
in his normal state, but the time has come when man has to begin to
perceive what arises out of his own being as thought forms. As you
know, we do not sleep only from the moment of falling asleep to the
moment of waking up; with a part of our being we sleep the whole day
through. We are awake only in regard to our thinking and sense
perceiving, we dream in regard to our life of feeling; we are sound
asleep in regard to our life of willing. For we know only of the
thoughts and ideas of our volition; we know nothing of the process of
willing. The activity of our will takes place just as unconsciously as
our sleep life from the moment of falling asleep to the moment of
waking up. But if we ask: By what path alone can knowledge of the
Divine reach the human being? we cannot point to the path through the
head, through sense perception and thinking, but only to the path that
leads through the rest of our organism. We have to deal here with the
great and mighty mystery that man's head has developed through long
stages of evolution and that gradually the rest of his organism was
added; that the head has already started on a retrogressive evolution
and that man can only experience the Divine through the rest of his
organism, not through the head. For you see, it is important to
realize that through the head only the Luciferic beings spoke to man.
We may say that man received the rest of his organism in addition to
the head in order that the Gods might speak to him. At the beginning
of the Bible we do not read: God sent a ray of light to man and
he became a living soul, but we read: God breathed the living breath
into man and he became a living soul. Here it is recognized that the
divine impulse reached the human being through an activity that is not
of the head.
From this it will become clear to you that this divine impulse could
at first come to man only in a kind of unconscious clairvoyance or,
rather, through the comprehension of what was given through
unconscious clairvoyance. If you consider the Old Testament you will
find that it is the result of unconscious clairvoyance (we know this
from former discussion). Those who helped in bringing about the Old
Testament were conscious of this fact. I cannot describe to you today
how the Old Testament came into existence, but I should like to point
out to you that we have repeatedly dealt with these matters, and that
the teachers of the ancient Hebrew people were conscious of the fact
that their God had spoken to them not through direct sense
perceptions, not through ordinary thinking, not through that of which
the head is the mediator, but that their God had spoken to them
through dreams, not ordinary dreams, but dreams permeated by reality.
God spoke to them in moments of clairvoyance, as when he spoke to
Moses out of the burning bush. And when the initiates of this ancient
time were asked about the way in which they received the divine calls
they answered: the Lord whose name is ineffable speaks to us; but he
speaks to us through his countenance. And the countenance of their God
they called Michael, that spiritual power who belongs to the
hierarchy of the Archangeloi. They felt their God as remaining unknown
even behind the experiences of the clairvoyant; but when the
clairvoyant, through the inner strength of his soul, raised himself to
his God, then Michael spoke to him. But this Michael spoke only to men
if they were able to transport themselves into a state of
consciousness different from the ordinary, if they were able to
transport themselves into the state of a certain clairvoyance in which
they became conscious of that which works and lives in the human being
during the period between going to sleep and awaking, or through the
will which remains subconscious and is in the sleep state even during
waking day consciousness.
Thus in ancient Hebrew occultism, the Yahve-revelation was called the
revelation of the night; the Yahve-revelation, through the
Michael-revelation, was felt as the revelation of the night. Thus, on
the one hand, man looked into the world and saw what he could receive
through sense perception and through human intelligent thinking, and
he said to himself: the knowledge that comes to the human being on
this path does not contain the Divine. If man, however, develops
another state of consciousness, then the countenance of God, Michael,
speaks to him and reveals the secrets that relate to the human being;
his revelation builds a bridge between the human being and those
powers which cannot be perceived in the external sense world, which
cannot be thought out by the brain-bound intellect.
Thus we must say: The human beings of the pre-Christian age directed
their gaze, on the one hand, toward sense knowledge which was their
guide in their earthly undertakings and, on the other hand, toward
that knowledge which the human being would only possess in ordinary
consciousness — he did not possess it — if this
consciousness were to remain awake also during the period of sleep.
During these ancient times of the Old Testament people knew that the
human being is in the environment of spiritual beings during his
waking hours, but that these spiritual beings are not his creator
beings, but the Luciferic beings. The beings which mankind felt to be
the divine creator beings were active in man from the moment of
falling asleep to awakening and also in that part of his nature which
sleeps during the day. In the time in which the Old Testament
originated Yahve was called the Ruler of the Night, and Michael, the
countenance of Yahve, was called the Servant of the Ruler of the Night.
And the people of that time referred to Michael when they referred to
the prophetic inspirations through which they received knowledge which
was greater than that of the sense world.
Which consciousness is concealed behind all this? That consciousness
which has grown out of the sphere of existence in which those powers
which include Yahve have their being, whereas the human head formation
is surrounded by Luciferic beings. The fact that the human being
through his head, as it reaches above the organism, has turned to the
Luciferic beings was a secret known in all ancient temples and it was
a secret with which man came very close to the truth. It was known
that, as the head rises above the human organism, Lucifer also rises
above it. The power which brought the human head out of the animal
form into its present shape is a Luciferic power; and the power which
man must feel as Divine must stream up into his head from the night
condition of the rest of his organism. This was the situation in
regard to man's knowledge in pre-Christian times.
Then the Mystery of Golgotha entered Earth evolution, and we know that
it signifies the union of a super-earthly Being with the Earth
evolution of man through the body of Jesus of Nazareth. Through the
Death on Golgotha the Being Whom we call the Christ has united Himself
with the human earth being. What did this signify for Earth
evolution? Through this event, Earth evolution first received
its real meaning. The earth would not have its meaning if man were to
develop on this earth with his senses and the intellect bound to the
head which are of Luciferic origin, if he were to perceive the world
of light streaming down from sun and stars upon the earth, but if he
were obliged to remain in the sleep state in order to perceive the
Divine. Under these conditions the earth would never have attained its
meaning, for the waking human being and the earth belong together. The
sleeping human being is not conscious of his connection with earthly
existence. Through the fact that the Christ Being has lived in a human
body which has passed through death, Earth evolution has taken
a forward bound. The whole Earth evolution has acquired a new
meaning. The possibility has arisen for the human being gradually to
be able to know his divine creator powers also during the day, during
ordinary waking life, that is, in his ordinary state of consciousness.
That people are still in error today concerning this matter is caused
by the fact that the time that has elapsed since the Mystery of
Golgotha has not yet sufficed to lead man to a perception, during
waking life, of that world which the prophets of the Old Testament
were able to behold in those times which they experienced as permeated
by revelations of Yahve, their Ruler of the Night, and of his
countenance, Michael. A period of transition was needed. But with the
close of the nineteenth century — all oriental wisdom points to
the importance of this close of the nineteenth century, although from
a completely different point of view — with the end of the
nineteenth century the time has come when human beings must recognize
that within them the latent faculty is ready to be awakened which is
able to behold, through day-revelation, that which in earlier times
was transmitted in night-revelation through Michael.
A time of great error, however, had to precede this, a night of
cognition, as it were. I have often said that I do not agree with
those who constantly maintain that our time is a period of transition.
I know quite well that every time is a period of transition, but I do
not want to stop short at such formal, abstract definitions, for the
point is that one should indicate clearly of what the transition of a
particular time consists. The transition in our time lies in man's
need to recognize that what formerly was obtained in night-knowledge
we must now obtain through day-knowledge. In other words: Michael was
the revealer through the night and in our age he must become the
revealer during the day. From being a spirit of night Michael must
become a spirit of day. For him the Mystery of Golgotha signifies the
transformation from a spirit of night into a spirit of day.
This knowledge which should make its way among human beings much
faster than we believe today had to be preceded by a great error, in
fact, by the greatest error imaginable in mankind's evolution, in
spite of its being still considered an important and essential truth
by many people today. The origin of the human head has become
completely hidden from modern mankind; the Luciferic spirituality
connected with the human head has become completely veiled. The human
being, as I said, was considered a unity, also in a bodily respect.
The question of his descent was raised, and the reply was given that
man descended from the animal; while, in truth, only that which is
Luciferic in man stems from the animal. That part of man, however,
through which his divine creators spoke to him in earlier ages during
his sleep state only came into existence as an appendage to the human
head, while the animal came into existence side by side with it.
Everything was mixed together, as it were, and man was said to have
descended from the animal. This is something like a
“penalty” of knowledge which arose for mankind. One must
give the word “penalty” a somewhat changed interpretation,
to be sure.
Whence comes the notion of man's descent from the animals, whereas the
truth consists of the facts we have stated in regard to the descent of
the head and the rest of the human organism? Who inspired the human
being with the fictitious belief that the whole of man descended from
the animal?
The theory of man's descent from the animal is an Ahrimanic
inspiration; it is of purely Ahrimanic character. To the obscuring of
the wisdom which points to the human head as a Luciferic formation, we
owe the delusion that man descends from the animal. In failing to
comprehend the descent of the human head in the right way man also
failed to grasp the other facts in the right manner. Thus the opinion
crept into human thinking that man, as a totality, is related to the
animal. The world conception of our modern civilization became
permeated by the erroneous idea that the human head is the noblest
part of man, and it was contrasted by the rest of his organism, just
as the good in the world is contrasted by evil — heaven by hell
— a duad instead of a triad. The truth is that what man
accomplishes in the world by means of his head he owes to the wisdom
of the universe, but to the Luciferic wisdom, and that this Luciferic
wisdom must gradually be permeated by other elements.
After mankind's evolution had passed through the Saturn, Sun
and Moon states and the Earth evolution had begun, that
spiritual power which we call the Michael power organized the
Luciferic nature into the human head formation. “And he cast his
opposing spirits down upon the earth,” that is, through this
casting down of the Luciferic spirits, opposing Michael, man became
permeated by this reason, by that which springs from his head.
Thus it is Michael who sent his opponents to man in order that, by
receiving this opposing Luciferic element, man might receive his
reason. Then the Mystery of Golgotha entered human evolution. The
Christ Being passed through the death of Jesus of Nazareth and united
Himself with the evolution of mankind.
The time of preparation has passed. Michael himself, in the
super-sensible worlds, has participated in the results of the Mystery
of Golgotha. Since the last third of the nineteenth century Michael
occupies a unique position in the evolution of humanity. The first
thing that must occur through the right understanding of man's
relation to Michael is the fathoming of such secrets as the one we
have endeavored to present today concerning the human head and the
rest of the human organism.
The essential thing is for human beings to see that since they did not
recognize the true origin of the head they were certain to fall into
delusion about the origin of the whole human being. Because they
refused to conceive of the Luciferic formative activity that took
place in the human head, they fell a prey to the delusion that the
human head had the same origin as the rest of the human being. Mankind
must penetrate these mysteries. It must, boldly and courageously, face
the knowledge that through taking hold of new divine mysteries it must
in its inner life improve all that is given to it through mere insight
of the head, through mere human, earthly wisdom or cleverness. And
first of all, the great error must be corrected which has preceded the
turning point, the error which lies in the materialistic
interpretation of the evolutionary theory of the descent of the whole
human being from the animal.
This will be the only way of arriving at a perception of man which
does not see, on the one hand, merely the spirit-soul element, living
in a body, as it were, and a soulless body, on the other hand; but
which beholds the concrete-spiritual which works, although in a
Luciferic manner, in the human head, the concrete-spiritual which
works in the whole human being, opposed, however, by the Ahrimanic
nature in the organism apart from the head.
Speaking in imaginations, we may point back to the fact that the
Luciferic element was incorporated in man through the Michael impulse.
Through that which Michael has become, the Ahrimanic element must now,
in turn, be taken from man. Seen from the aspect of outer science, the
truth about man appears to consist of anatomical and physiological
knowledge, or that which confronts us as outer sense observation. We
must become capable of looking at the human being in such a way that
we can see in his every fiber the concrete-spiritual being together
with the bodily element. We must become aware that the blood which
flows in the living human being is not the same as the blood we draw
off, but that the blood flowing in the living human being is permeated
by spirit in a special way. We must learn to know the spirit that
pulses through the blood. We must learn to know the spirit that pulses
through the nervous system just when the latter passes through a phase
of breaking down, and so forth. We must become able to see the
spiritual element in every single expression of life.
Michael is the spirit of strength. As he enters human evolution he
must bring it about that we do not consider on the one hand abstract
spirituality and on the other materiality which we listen to with the
stethoscope, which we cut up, and of which we have not the slightest
inkling that it is only an externally manifesting form of the
spiritual; Michael must permeate us as the strong power which can look
through the material and see the spiritual in matter. The Evangelist
pointed to an ancient stage of human consciousness and he said: In
this ancient time the Word lived in a spiritual way; but the Word
became flesh and dwelt among us. The Word united with the flesh and
the Michael revelation preceded this event. It is processes in human
consciousness that are indicated here. The reverse process must now
begin which consists in adding another word to the word of the
evangelist. We must acquire the power in our consciousness to see how
the human being receives that which out of the spiritual worlds has
united itself with the earth through the Christ impulse and which must
unite itself with mankind in order that mankind shall not perish with
the earth. We must make sure that man takes the spiritual not only
into his head but into his whole being, that he permeates himself with
the spiritual. Only the Christ impulse can help us with this, the
Christ impulse in the interpretation of the Michael impulse. Then to
the Evangelist's words these may be added: “And the time must
come when the flesh will again become the Word and learn to dwell in
the realm of the Word.”
It is not an invention by a later writer when, added at the conclusion
of the Gospel, we read that much has been left unsaid. By this means
attention is drawn to that which can only gradually be revealed to
mankind. Those who maintain that the Gospels must remain as they are
and must not be touched understand them very little. They must be
interpreted according to the words of the Christ Jesus — I have
mentioned this repeatedly —: “I am with you every day even to the
end of the earth cycles.” That means: “I have revealed
Myself to you not only during the days in which the Gospels were
written, I will speak to you always through My day spirit, Michael, if
you seek the way to Me. Through the continuous Christ revelation you
may add to the Gospels that which was not known in the Gospel of the
first millennium but which can be known in the Gospel of the second;
and new things may be added during the millennia to come.” What
is written in the Gospel is true: “In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” It is, however,
just as true that we must add the revelation: “And the flesh of
man must again become spiritualized that it may be able to dwell in
the kingdom of the Word in order to behold the divine mysteries.”
The Word becoming flesh is the first Michael revelation; the flesh
becoming Spirit must be the second Michael revelation.
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