The Rudolf Steiner Archive

12. Reincarnation and Karma

[ 1 ] There are mysteries of the world that interest those who wish to delve deeper into the structure, into the fabric of our existence. Such mysteries of the world include, for example, the following: Where do matter and forces come from? Where does life in the world come from? Where does the purposefulness in nature come from, and where does that which we call consciousness come from? How should we assess the question of the origin of language, and the question of the mystery of free will? These are all questions that certainly present themselves to those who wish to delve deeper into the understanding of existence—questions that cannot be foreign to an advanced, educated mind. But before these questions, there are more immediate, great questions of humanity that, at first glance, have no theoretical or scientific value, yet which also impose themselves upon us—questions that cause us, amid the labors and struggles of life, to look up toward what we might call the imperishable in contrast to the perishable. These questions are connected to what we encounter at every turn, to what confronts us as a mystery everywhere in the world. These are questions on whose answers not only the satisfaction of our theoretical or scientific interest depends, but also whether we have strength, courage, and security in life, and whether we have hope for a prosperous future for the human race and for each individual.

[ 2 ] Such questions about life arise when we turn our gaze to the immediate existence of human beings, when we see how one person is endowed at birth with limited abilities and strength, and is so predisposed by these meager aptitudes and talents that we can foresee how he is condemned to a miserable, wretched existence that he must endure from birth to death. He may be born into a family in such a way that, through circumstances and facts beyond his control, he already appears condemned to misery. Another is born into a family that ensures from the outset that he will have a happy, joyful existence; he possesses talents and abilities such that we can say he will accomplish great and significant things in life. All of this and more—which we encounter every day, every hour, and every moment when we observe life as it presents itself to us with an open mind—encompasses the great and immediate mysteries. The great worldviews and their proponents have always strived to solve these mysteries of existence for humanity. But in every new era, the mysteries of existence require a new solution. Not that the old truths are no longer true—that is not the point—but rather that people’s thinking and feeling change; that the soul’s perception changes more than is commonly believed; and that while new questions are not raised, the old questions are posed in a different way. The theosophical or spiritual-scientific view of life, which has been spreading in educated cultures for thirty years, attempts to solve the mysteries of existence in such a way that modern people can find satisfaction in such a solution.

[ 3 ] There are two concepts that permeate the spiritual-scientific worldview and form the subject of our discussion today; they are intended to provide answers to the questions raised: the two ideas of reincarnation—or the repeated earthly lives of human beings—and of karma—or the great law of destiny governing existence. Through these two ideas, the spiritual-scientific worldview seeks to answer the enigmatic questions of existence in the same way that the natural scientist—indeed, the researcher in general—answers his questions based on insight and knowledge, not on mere belief. What the spiritual-scientific worldview seeks to offer is no different in character from what other fields of research seek to offer; the only difference, perhaps, is that understanding and grasping scientific truths requires certain prerequisites. A certain scientific foundation is also almost always part of popular scientific presentations. However, the theosophical or spiritual-scientific worldview will be truly understandable to every person, it will bring satisfaction to every person, from the simple, naive mind—which is only capable of following the questions and answers with feeling and emotion—all the way up to the most learned sage, who initially approaches these matters with the greatest skepticism and who, provided he has the patience and perseverance to work his way into them, will find satisfaction in doing so. They will all not only find satisfaction, not only experience that sense of relief that enters our soul when, after longing expectantly for a long time, we finally receive an answer to some question—whoever knows this feeling knows something of the soul’s intimate sense of happiness—but with regard to the question of life, it also offers something entirely different. What is at stake here is not merely what satisfies our thirst for knowledge, but something that gives us security in life, something that is meant to provide an answer not just for individual, but for all the powers of the soul.

[ 4 ] Since we are addressing such important, such important and fundamental questions today, let me state right away in what sense the answers provided by the humanities—based on life itself—are to be understood. Often, out of a complete misunderstanding, the humanities scholar is challenged: “Provide us with proof of what you’re claiming if we are to believe what you tell us about higher, spiritual worlds and about things that are initially inaccessible to the ordinary senses of experience.” — Properly speaking, the spiritual scientist can only reply: No one needs to believe me; I demand nothing more from anyone than trust in my assertions, for the kind of proof that is usually demanded simply cannot exist for spiritual scientific truths. Anyone who demands such proof does not understand the nature and meaning of spiritual scientific truths. Life itself provides the proof for spiritual scientific truths, and it does so not only when we observe it sensually here within the realm of what our own eyes, ears, and sense of touch teach us, but also in the broadest sense, extending all the way up to the highest spiritual realms of life. If someone comes along and says, “I don’t believe what you’re saying, because it might be something you’ve made up; it might be fantasy”—then one can reply: “Fine, believe that; believe that the scholars of the spiritual sciences are the greatest charlatans in the world.” But there is something else that lies between belief and disbelief. That is impartial listening. — Take a striking example. Take a map of Asia Minor. A man says, “That’s not a map of Asia Minor; you just made it up.” — One can only reply: “Fine, that doesn’t matter, but remember what I’ve shown you on it, take note of it, and commit it to memory.” When you get to Asia Minor, you’ll see that it’s actually true. — The same is true of the teachings of the spiritual sciences. No one needs to believe in them. If we’re simply willing to observe attentively and without prejudice, there’s plenty of evidence for them in life—even for life after we’ve passed through the gate of death and are in the afterlife.

[ 5 ] The old questions must be answered in a new way. As late as the 17th century, it was not merely a superstition of the masses, but a common belief among all scholars who thought they understood something about the natural sciences, that not only very lowly animals but even earthworms could grow out of ordinary river mud. This was a widely held belief. People were not convinced that an earthworm must come from another earthworm; rather, they believed it arose from the mud. The Italian naturalist Redi formulated the principle: “Life comes only from life. Life never arises from the non-living.” Earthworms do not arise from mud, but through the reproduction of an earthworm. — That is how recent this conviction is! This is how the human race progresses in regard to the truth. Today, anyone who believed that earthworms could grow out of mud would be considered a fool. What Redi articulated back then—he who narrowly escaped the fate that befell Giordano Bruno—applies today to the spiritual-scientific worldview. Just as it was completely contrary to the habits of thought at that time to admit that living things must originate from living things, so the doctrine of reincarnation is contrary to the habits of thought of the present. Some people are downright enraged by the truths of spiritual science, just as people were enraged back then when it was claimed that earthworms do not grow out of the mud. In the same sense as what I have just asserted, the spiritual-scientific worldview states: The spiritual-soul aspect comes only from the spiritual-soul aspect. — Unless folly prevails over reason, there is no doubt that in another two centuries, just as scientific truth has done, the spiritual-psychological worldview will have taken hold in all circles.

[ 6 ] What does it mean to say that spiritual-psychic phenomena arise only from spiritual-psychic sources? It is spiritual-psychic when we are confronted with a person’s fate as it depends on external circumstances, on innate dispositions and abilities, and on their entire character. Only someone who is unable to observe the subtle, intimate characteristics of a human soul as it develops, only someone who has a sense only for the coarse physical, can deny that we see something growing within the child that can no more be explained by something non-spiritual or non-soul-related than the earthworm can be explained by the mud. Schiller’s nose, Schiller’s red hair, and many other features of his physiognomy can certainly be explained by physical heredity, just as the carbon and oxygen components in the earthworm originate from other carbon and oxygen components in the environment. The inanimate parts of the earthworm come from the inanimate parts of the surrounding natural world, and in the same way, the physical parts of our body come from the physical environment. But we can explain Schiller’s abilities and talents just as little from the environment as we can explain earthworms from the mud. Yet Schiller is not the point. He is cited here merely as a radical example. For every human being, even the simplest, it is true that they gradually develop out of what is generic within them. It is impossible to derive the individual from physical heredity. Even in broad terms, this is easy to see. Try to understand how Goethe’s saying applies here: “Mysterious in broad daylight, nature cannot be stripped of her veil, and what she chooses not to reveal to your mind, you cannot force from her with levers and screws.” So this is not a matter for forceps or a microscope. Look at the child as it appears to you in the first months and years of life. The face reveals what the child has inherited from its father, mother, and ancestors. It reveals what is universally human, what is generic, the tribal character, and the family character. We often say that a child’s gentle features come from the father, the mother, an uncle, or an aunt. But then, as we watch the child grow up, a remarkable transformation takes place within them, one that is quite visible to a more refined sensibility. What we can perceive as the convergence of father, mother, grandmother, and so on—like an imprint—transforms and takes shape from the inner being itself. And that which lives in the innermost being—which cannot be derived from the father or mother—gradually expresses itself in the facial features. The more individuality there is, the more that which transcends the generic lives within the soul, the more the soul shapes the body from within and transforms it. And where could the essence of a great thinker, a great benefactor of the world—who works from within and enriches the world with something new—be explained by heredity? From the face, you can see how a person grows beyond mere species existence. In every human being, a spiritual core of being is revealed, one that is not born out of physical heredity but is born into it. If you cannot trace this spiritual core back to father and mother, ancestors, and forefathers, then we must be able to trace it back to something spiritual. Spiritual-soul elements originate from spiritual-soul elements. There is only the idea of evolution, the idea of repeated incarnation. The being that imprints its features on the child was already there; it has been there repeatedly in the body. There you will find an explanation for the spiritual-soul aspect just as you find an explanation for the earthworm when you say that the earthworm arose from an earthworm and not from mud or sand. Once there was something imperfect, but we cannot go into that in this lecture.

[ 7 ] How, then, does spiritual science explain the perfect and the imperfect in the realm of the soul and spirit? Just as the tiny plasmodium—in the manner described by Haeckel—arose from simple conditions of life, and just as the subsequent animal gradually took shape through the development of its external physical form, so too can we say of a perfect soul that it has gradually formed from an imperfect soul that has gradually become more perfect. The imperfect savage, with his childlike soul, has preserved for us that form of our soul through which we had to pass in order to elevate ourselves to the spiritual form of our soul. Or compare the soul of an average European with the soul of a person such as Darwin once encountered. The soul of a modern person has concepts of good and evil, of right and wrong, of false and true. Darwin once tried to explain to a savage who was still a cannibal: “You must not eat people; that is wrong; you must not do that.” — The savage looked at him curiously and said: “Yes, how can you know that? You’d have to have eaten him first. Once we’ve eaten him, then we’ll know whether he was good or bad.” — So you have an imperfect soul that will become more and more perfect through evolution. Our soul is not born as a baby in every single person; rather, this soul first developed in imperfect incarnations, where it understood nothing of good and evil other than what was pleasant and unpleasant to the palate and the like. It has developed through such stages and, through many incarnations of constant learning, has advanced to our level. We carry our soul within us, along with the abilities and powers we possess, and the fate it endures. We will see more clearly when we return in another incarnation on Earth; we will appear on Earth in ever more perfect forms until we reach the stage where we are ready to ascend to a higher and more divine existence—one we need not discuss today. There are certainly other explanations of existence besides the doctrine of reincarnation, but this alone can solve the mysteries of existence for humankind. A core of existence confronts us in that human being of whom we say that he passes through many lives, through repeated lives. While the materialist tells us that spirit and soul are merely appendages to the body, that they are merely derived from the body, and that thoughts, ideas, and language are merely a higher development of what we also encounter in the physical-animal realm, while the materialist makes it clear to us that our most exalted moral ideals and our most sacred religious feelings are nothing other than the results of our physical organization—the spiritual-scientific worldview shows us that all that resides in our soul is our eternal core of being, which, on the contrary, has shaped and formed its body step by step. The physical-bodily originates from the spiritual-soul: this is the teaching of the spiritual-scientific worldview, which will become ever clearer the deeper you immerse yourselves in it. It is a teaching that is not based on blind faith, although, if one wishes to present it in a popular way in a short hour, one can only briefly outline it and cannot provide a comprehensive introduction to it. It is, however, a teaching that is just as securely and firmly grounded as any scientific teaching. It works with the same methods—only in the spiritual realm—that the sensory sciences employ in the physical realm. Spiritual science teaches that human beings consist of a higher and a lower nature, and that when a person passes through the gate of death, their lower nature is returned to the elements to which it belongs. The body is returned to the earth; other parts are returned to other elements. But there is an eternal core of being within the human being that continually takes on new human forms and shapes, just as the lily, as a species, continually takes on new forms by repeatedly passing through the seed to come into a new living existence.

[ 8 ] This doctrine of the reincarnation of the being—which spiritual development reveals to us as the higher counterpart to development in the sensory realm—leads us to perceive those finer, more intimate aspects of the human being. We speak of how this core of the human being contains a threefold fundamental essence, that it is of a threefold nature; we speak of how, in the deepest innermost part of the human being, there lies something that—as it exists today among the normally educated people among us—is still entirely undeveloped in most people, present only in embryonic form. We call this innermost core of the human being the Atma, or the spiritual human being. For the majority of people today, it is not even visible to the soul’s gaze.

[ 9 ] A second aspect of this spiritual core of the human being is the Buddhi. In German, we would call it the “spirit of life.” This second element in the human soul is something that finds expression in a certain way in the most highly developed individuals—the leaders and guides of humanity. We can describe, to a certain extent, what this “spirit of life” is. It is this Buddhi, in its highest glory and sublimity, that lived within the ancient founders of religions—Hermes, Buddha, Zarathustra—and, to the highest degree, within Christ Jesus. If I am to clarify what this Buddhi means in the spiritual realm, I can do so only through a parable. One must either see the spiritual, or, like Goethe, who says, “All that is transitory is but a parable,” one must express the eternal and imperishable in a parable. I would like to offer such a parable for Buddhi. If you imagine the ordinary creative power in ordinary sensory life, paired with love—but not as a receiving love, rather as a love that is entirely giving—that is Buddhi. There is scarcely any other parable in nature than that of the hen sitting on her egg, conjuring forth new life with her own body heat, sacrificing her own existence in an act of love for the sake of the new life. Now imagine this transposed into the spiritual realm; imagine an individuality that brings forth the great, driving forces in human nature—that which serves as the impulse for our human evolution—in a spiritual manner, just as has been described, and then you have it. Or was not what, for two millennia, has been the blessing of the soul and the emotions—flooding through Western and American hearts and filling us with bliss—was not the element of Christian feeling and sensibility a fundamental force, not something brought forth by Christ and present in Christ? And was it not brought into this world in the most glorious manner, representing in the spirit what lives in the physical realm—the self-sacrificing love that brings forth—not a human being, but a spiritual love that creates the wisdom of the worlds, which endures through the centuries? Imagine this element within human nature, and we have what we call the Christ in Christian mysticism, the Chrestòs in Greek mysticism, and the Buddhi in Eastern mysticism—the spirit of life in its highest potency. Anyone who senses even a little of what it means to produce spiritually—that which is incorporated as a force in human evolution, that which provides impulses in spiritual life—anyone who senses even a little of this has, in spiritual, bright, luminous clarity, a feeling similar to that expressed here below through a parable: the true sense of bliss with which the hen sits on her egg. That is the Buddhi. To a certain extent, it is present in every single human being, at least in potential.

[ 10 ] The third power of the soul is the one through which we comprehend the world, through which we grasp the world. It would be utterly foolish to believe that one could draw water from a vessel if there were no water in it. Yet those who say they can draw wisdom from the world when there is none in it are just as foolish. The astronomer seeks to calculate and comprehend wisdom in the world. Only through wisdom can the world be understood. Would it not be the greatest folly to want to draw wisdom from the world if there were no wisdom within it? If wisdom were not given, we could never draw it from there. The world was created by the very same wisdom with which we seek to comprehend it. This is the third element that permeates the entire world. This is the Manas. It is best translated into German by saying: “Wisdom is born out of the world.” — Our spiritual self is this third element. If you take these three things: Atma, Buddhi, and Manas, then you have the deepest core of human being; then you have that which passes from reincarnation to reincarnation—that which is formed, albeit imperfectly, from the most primitive state, where this trinity also exists at lower levels, all the way up to where we see it in the present-day normal human being, and all the way up to where we see it in the great leaders of humanity. From one reincarnation to the next, the human being progresses—from the spiritually formed being to the spiritual leader of humanity, who is not merely ideal but sacred—all the way to Francis of Assisi, Bernard, or others. By observing how these individuals stand side by side in this process of development, the student can fully grasp the passage through repeated earthly lives.

[ 11 ] To those who look more closely, what I have described is expressed in the whole human being. I have said that this core essence of the human being is present only as a potential in the normally developed human being. It will become more and more perfect. But what we shape today out of our core essence is what has shaped and created us from the very beginning. Thus we see how this threefold being, this core of the being, works within the human being, first unconsciously and then consciously. Earlier I mentioned just one example of how the inner being of the human being is expressed in the physiognomy of the thinker. The core of the being expresses itself not only in the permanent features of the face, but also in gestures and in the mobility of the facial features. They are gradually shaped in accordance with the way the core of the being develops in the child. What is actually called spiritual research or occultism reveals to you the connection between this threefold nature of the human being and what is expressed outwardly in the body, in the human instrument. The so-called occultist says that in human beings, what we call Manas—the mental self—is first expressed in the features of the face. That which we call Buddhi takes shape in the speech organ, lives in the voice, and serves to prepare for and foreshadow future stages. The third, which we call Atma, lives in human beings through gesture and the movement of the hand. I said that the second principle, Buddhi—or, as you saw earlier, the Christ—lives in the vocal organ and in the voice. Christian mysticism has expressed this in the deepest way in the Gospel of John, where it is written: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” John directly identifies speech as the Christ. In the female nature, it is somewhat different. This, of course, in no way contradicts the absolute equality of the sexes practiced in Theosophy. Atma, Buddhi, and Manas are the same in both men and women. They have nothing to do with gender, but rather with outward form. In women, Manas is expressed through speech, Buddhi through hand gestures, and Atma is manifested throughout the entire body. These are the so-called occult differences between the male and female forms, not between the essential core of men and women.

[ 12 ] How does the law of karma relate to this idea of reincarnation? Karma comes from—or is at least related to—the Sanskrit word *karnoti*, which means “to do,” “to make,” or “to act.” It shares exactly the same root as the Latin *creare*, meaning “to create.” *Creare*, “to make” and “to create,” is therefore exactly the same thing. Karma and creation are the same thing, merely expressed in two different languages. Now let’s clarify what karma means. Karma means—to put it in German terms—activity, becoming, action. Let me use a simple example to further clarify what karma means. Imagine you’re working on something from morning till night. You then go to sleep, sleep through the night, and get up again in the morning. If you were to say to yourself now: “What I worked on yesterday is none of my business; I’ll start fresh today”—you would be acting foolishly. The only possible course of action is to pick up where you left off the previous evening, saying, “This is my work, and where I stopped yesterday is where I must begin again today.” What does that mean? It simply means that my work from yesterday determines my fate today. Yesterday, I created my fate for today. This encapsulates the entire concept of karma. Every being crafts its own fate for the future.

[ 13 ] Take another example. Animals migrated into dark caves. Something peculiar happens to these animals. They lose their eyesight. The nutrients are redirected to other parts of the body that need them more than vision does. The result is that their eyesight recedes, and the animals go blind. What do we see before us when we observe these animals producing blind generations time and again? We must conclude that the animals’ blindness is the effect of their having been drawn into dark caves. How did these animals bring about their present condition? Through their previous actions. Karma is nothing other than preparing one’s destiny for the future through one’s actions in the past. Cause and effect are always interconnected. As a human being goes through an earthly life between birth and death, they perform a number of actions. In the meantime, they pass through death and rebirth and then enter a new life. It is as if we were to wake up and pick up where we left off the night before. What we have sown in past earthly lives, we reap as fruit in the new earthly life. If we have brought upon ourselves an evil, repulsive fate in a past life, then the consequences of our own actions will confront us in the new earthly life. If we have done evil to a person, that person will reappear to us in the new life and, in return, will inflict evil upon us. When a person confronts me and commits evil, I can assume that I was already with him in earlier earthly lives and that I myself laid the foundation for what he is now doing to me. Thus, the fate of the individual becomes clearer and more understandable through the great law of karma, and the greatest mystery of life—which confronts us at every turn—is illuminated and resolved. Now I am given the explanation as to why one person was born into the deepest distress and misery, and why such a repulsive fate—seemingly undeserved—confronts him here in life. It is like the person who did not do his work properly yesterday. Because of yesterday’s poor preparation, he will be condemned to do poor work again today. So it is when I say that the one who now suffers hardship and misery has brought it upon himself in a past life. I also know that nothing remains without consequence. Whatever good or evil deeds I commit now will have their effect in the life to come. The effect in the world is linked to the cause, as can be observed instructively in the stars and the sun. So it is also in the spiritual-soul world. What we bring upon ourselves now will find its balance in a later life. The biblical saying is true: God will not be mocked; what you sow, that you will also reap. — Paul, as an initiate, surely knew why he specifically uttered such a saying. This is the great law of the universe that guides human destiny.

[ 14 ] Now I am well aware that it is also necessary to gain some understanding of how this law works, and I would like to say a few more words about that. Anyone who has heard other lectures of mine already knows what I am getting at here. When we look at a human being with spiritual insight, he does not stand before us as this physical body; rather, we know that this physical body is only a part of the greater being, that behind it there is something that Paul calls the spiritual body and that the spiritual scientist calls the etheric body. The etheric body is like a reflection of the physical body—or rather, the physical body is a reflection of the etheric body. This is the second member of the human being: the etheric body. The third component is the astral body—that which a person carries within themselves as pleasure and suffering, joy and pain, instincts, drives, passions, and desires—everything that stands before us when a person stands before us, yet which we cannot see or perceive through physical, sensory means. What do we see when a person stands before us? We see the skin, its color, and so on. The anatomist can still observe bones, muscles, nerves, and so on using physical means, but pleasure and pain, instincts, desires, and passions—which are also present in the same space—cannot be perceived by the senses. This is called the astral body, and it is within this that the spiritual essence of the human being resides—what we call our “I,” the bearer of our self-consciousness. By possessing this, we in turn become bearers of Atma, Buddhi, and Manas—of what I have described as the spiritual self, the life spirit, and the spiritual human being.

[ 15 ] Even animals possess an astral body. They experience desire, joy, and pain. But what exists in its highest form in the leaders of humanity and, in potential, in all people, is the eternal core of the human being, which progresses from incarnation to incarnation. When a human being dies, what remains and what passes away? The physical body—that which can be seen with the eyes and touched with the hands—is returned to the earth. The etheric body dissolves into the general life ether, and this occurs shortly after we have passed through death. The third is the astral body, the one on which the human being has already worked. Take, for example, a soul living within a civilized human being: there you have the inner core of the being and, alongside it, the sum of the drives and passions. In the case of the primitive human, at the first stage of incarnation, Atma, Buddhi, and Manas have done little work on the instincts. Therefore, these instincts are still animalistic. What does the spiritual core of the being do? It works continuously to refine the animalistic passions. This is what distinguishes the civilized human from the primitive human: that the astral body is no longer animalistic in the former. Then the human being dies and returns to the spiritual-soul world. There one sees what remained within him as an impulse from his first incarnation. When the human being enters incarnation for the first time, the animal passions are unrefined. He preys on his fellow human beings and so on. Then the consequences arise. That is when he begins, in the crudest sense, to understand something. Let us assume the extreme case in which he tells himself: If I can devour others, then others can also devour me. He realizes that he, too, might be devoured. At the very last moment, it becomes clear to him where this is leading, and his first moral consciousness dawns within him, very faintly. Then he purifies his instincts through the judgment he has formed, and this judgment arises from the core of his spiritual being. What he has developed as a judgment appears as a predisposition in his second incarnation. He has become a little nobler. And now he purifies his passions and instincts more and more. He elevates them from incarnation to incarnation. This is what really happens when a human being dies. The physical body is returned to the earth; the etheric body dissolves into the life ether. What happens to the human being now? What takes place at this point?

[ 16 ] It is not merely the ability to see into the world clairvoyantly; reason alone could teach those who reflect more deeply what must happen. The person is now disembodied; he has no physical body. But what has he done throughout his entire life? Throughout his life, he has used his sense of taste to derive pleasure from eating. This pleasure in eating—the deliciousness of food, the delight of the palate—is spiritual. The palate itself is physical. If a person did not have the physical, he could not derive spiritual pleasure. If he had no physical ear, he could not hear; if he had no physical eye, he could not see. Everything we perceive, we first perceive through the physical senses. Modern man cannot perceive anything without his physical senses. He is bound to them and accustomed to them. He is accustomed to satisfying those desires that can be satisfied through the sensory organs. The habit of having desires and seeking pleasure remains, but the means by which he can satisfy them are lost; his tongue, eyes, and ears are gone. He no longer has them. Now, after death, he lacks them. He still craves the pleasure that can be obtained and satisfied only through the sensory organs. The consequence of this is that after death, a person enters a state of consciousness that essentially consists of weaning oneself off the habit of being satisfied solely through the sense organs. The soul must wean itself from craving sensual satisfaction; it must purify itself of what satisfied it on Earth and what can be satisfied only through sensual, physical means. This is what Kamaloka signifies in the theosophical worldview. It corresponds to what we call Purgatory, the purifying fire. One can not inaccurately compare what a person experiences there to a burning thirst, to a kind of burning deprivation. Such is this state after death. Sensually and physically, the corresponding means are not present after death; the organ through which the thirsting soul can be satisfied is no longer present. When, over the course of years in Kamaloka, a soul has weaned itself from this connection with the physical, it then lives in the spiritual world to which it belongs as a soul. And it takes this with it into the spiritual world. The spiritual-scientific worldview calls this spiritual world Devachan or the Land of Spirits. What does the soul take with it? Its purified desires and passions. These are now spiritualized and purified of their physical nature. When a person was incarnated on Earth, they take what they have attained with them into Devachan and process it there in preparation for a new earthly incarnation. An experience they have had must be transformed there into a life force. It is not enough for a person to simply have an experience. Consider carefully the difference between experience and life force. When an undeveloped soul learns through consequence that it is impossible to devour one’s fellow human beings without putting oneself in danger and causing harm—when this presents itself to the soul as an experience—that is the experience that must be transformed into life force, so that an inner voice arises: You must not eat a human being. — Then this becomes will, the voice of conscience, which will become more and more perfect the more incarnations we have undergone. Experience is transformed into will, into the voice of conscience, over the course of incarnations. And now you know what a person does in Devachan. In Kamaloka, the soul purifies itself; in Devachan, it transforms the experiences it has into strength for the next earthly life, so that it may emerge as a powerful, inner, individual nature. That is why you can recognize when an undeveloped soul appears in a primitive state; this is evident in its gestures and facial features, in its hand movements, as something generic. The more incarnations a soul has undergone, the more the individuality emerges. And what is it that takes shape? It is the experiences of its previous incarnations that become its character.

[ 17 ] Now you might ask: Why don’t people remember their past incarnations? — This question, as it is phrased, makes little sense. You will see why in a moment. It is as if someone were to come along and say: People call themselves human beings, and here stands a four-year-old child who cannot do arithmetic—and now he says: This child cannot do arithmetic, but he is a human being, so human beings cannot do arithmetic. — Yet this is a matter of development. Every person will eventually reach the point where some more advanced individuals have already arrived—those who can remember their past earthly lives. If a person cannot remember, it is because they must first acquire this ability, just as a child acquires the ability to read, do arithmetic, and write. A person must not let fate pass them by in a state of apathy if they wish to rise, through these experiences, to the point where they can remember their past earthly lives. How, then, does this recollection of past earthly lives occur?

[ 18 ] This life is contingent upon a person having developed as much as possible of their inner spiritual core. The freer and more independent a person has become in this life from sensuality, the more they live in the soul, the less they depend on the pleasures conveyed through the senses—the closer they come to the state in which they recognize themselves in their past lives. But how could such a person remember past earthly lives? One need only examine what usually fills the mind of an ordinary person. Only what sensory perception offers! That naturally disappears, for a memory of past earthly lives is not possible under such circumstances. Only when a person leads a life within his divine Self does he recall, to the same extent, what he experienced in his past incarnations; and those who immerse themselves in the spiritual life will surely be reincarnated with a recollection of that spiritual life.

[ 19 ] Another objection is commonly raised against the doctrine of karma. People say, “Well, it’s just the old law of fate.” But now it is claimed that human beings have prepared everything for themselves in their previous earthly lives. Fate and character are thereby irrevocably determined. There is no longer any freedom or free will. We are subject to a fate. — If someone were to say that, it would be just as sensible as if someone were to say: Here I have a cash book. On the left I have all the debit entries, on the right all the credit entries. If I add both sides together, a certain number comes out. If I subtract one number from the other, the result is the profit or loss. If I add this back to one side, we have a balance sheet. — Certainly, it’s the same with a life balance sheet. Good deeds are on one side, bad and foolish deeds on the other. There is also a life account with a life balance sheet, just as there are accounts and a balance sheet in commercial bookkeeping. Now imagine a merchant who said, “My annual financial statement is complete; I can’t make any more entries, I can’t do any new business, because everything I’m still allowed to do is predetermined by the earlier entries.” — It would be the same if a person said, “I can’t commit any new deeds.” The entries and the final statement don’t forbid him from doing so. Just as bookkeeping does not forbid the merchant from conducting new business, neither does karma forbid him from performing good or evil deeds. At every moment we can enter new entries; at every moment we can increase the debit and credit sides. Some also say: “If I help someone in need and misery, I am interfering with their karma.” But I must not do that.—That is not the case. You can help a person record new and good entries in their karma and thereby make their life account a favorable one. Whatever you write into it that is lazy, careless, or fatalistic is not so positively connected to the law of karma. However, something else is connected to the law of karma.

[ 20 ] If you see a chemist entering his laboratory, he may be going in with a specific idea: If I combine sulfur, oxygen, and hydrogen in a certain way, sulfuric acid will be produced according to an immutable law. There is nothing wrong with this law. But the chemist is free to choose whether or not to carry out the mixture; he can do it or not. The law does not interfere with his free will at all. But the law gives him the certainty that what is meant to happen will indeed happen when it is meant to happen. The same mixture does not produce carbonic acid one time and sulfuric acid the next. The law allows us to rely on a specific outcome. The same is true of karma. The law of karma cannot prevent us from performing any action, but it gives us the assurance that a proper and just balance must take place in life—that every good deed must have its good effect and every wise deed its corresponding effect. The fact that everything happens according to a spiritual law gives us this assurance; it shows us that nothing we do is left to chance, but that everything we do is done in such a way that we can rely on a proper cosmic order.

[ 21 ] Thus, this law of karma is not merely a scientific law, not something that merely satisfies theoretical interest, but something that holds the key to solving the riddle of life, the riddle of the universe. It provides strength and security in life; it works in such a way that we know everything in this life is interconnected according to a law that is being recognized more and more—a law that we interpret first unconsciously and then with increasing awareness. It is not merely the thirst for knowledge that is satisfied by the spiritual-scientific worldview. It also provides something else: namely, strength, courage, and security. Not only are we told something about our destiny, but at the same time we are given the opportunity to live in accordance with this destiny—to live in such a way that we advance toward an ever more perfect existence. Thus, the solution to the riddle of life through the two facts of reincarnation and the law of karma is not dogmatic or didactic, but full of life and imbued with feeling.

[ 22 ] All those who have taken a deeper look into nature—into the nature of spiritual life—have, to a greater or lesser extent, arrived at this law of destiny and the law of reincarnation. Giordano Bruno was a proponent of this law, and when a new spiritual culture was brought forth from a state of intellectual stagnation, it was Lessing who gave full expression to his wisdom in the doctrine of reincarnation. I know that many refrain from criticizing Lessing. But if one chooses to praise him, they will not go along with it. Yet it is strange, when dealing with a great man, to accept from him only what suits one’s own views. And the same is true of Giordano Bruno and Goethe, whose ideas are dismissed as senility or something similar. We shall see that our German Theosophy, too, is deeply imbued with this view. But only today—only in the last few decades—has it become possible to once again speak publicly about this view. Throughout the centuries of this new development, this was not possible because human culture had a different task, as I have already explained. The teachings of reincarnation and karma emerged dimly, and even these great minds could proclaim many things only figuratively, through symbols; they grasped them with a vivid sense of life. Where life could be made understandable to them in its deepest depths, they often pointed to these truths with great humor, to this eternal law of reincarnation that determines what we now experience between birth and death. Goethe alluded to this when he sought to express his deep inner soul-friendship with Frau von Stein, saying: “Ah, in times past, you were my sister or my wife.” But Goethe, like other great minds, also expresses the law that governs us as the law of karma. He expresses the fact that we enter the world according to our nature, as we are, following the law of cause and effect—just as everything in the world does—in these beautiful words:

Just as on the day you were born into this world,
The sun stood in greeting to the planets,
And so you flourished immediately and ever onward
According to the law by which you came into being.
This is how you must be; you cannot escape it,
As the Sibyls and prophets have long said,
And no time, no power can break apart
A formed shape that develops while alive.

[ 23 ] But the deepest things he had to say, he expressed through imagery, including in that beautiful poem where he compares the human soul to water and human destiny to the wind—the soul as that which flows from incarnation to incarnation in the stream of life, and destiny as the wind that causes this soul to rise and fall in everlasting waves. And just as each successive wave depends in its form on the one that precedes it, so the soul depends on its previous form; and just as the wind is ever renewed, so something ever new will flow into the account of human life, something ever new will be recorded there. “Human soul, how you resemble water; human fate, how you resemble the wind,” he says at the end of the poem, where he directly depicts reincarnation in earthly life. “The human soul resembles water; it comes from heaven, rises to heaven, and must descend again to earth, eternally changing.” This is how Goethe depicts the soul. It comes from the spiritual world, descends to Earth, returns to heaven, and comes back in a new incarnation:

The human soul
Is like water:
It comes from the heavens,
It rises to the heavens,
And must descend once more
To the earth,
Eternally changing.

Flowing from the high,
steep rock face
The pure stream,
Then it gently sprays
In waves of mist
Upon the smooth rock,
And, gently received,
It surges, veiling,
Softly rushing
Down into the depths.

Cliffs rise,
Toward the precipice,
It foams sullenly
Step by step
Toward the abyss.
In its shallow bed
It creeps through the meadow valley,
And in the smooth lake
All the stars
Reflect their faces.

The wind is the wave
Lovely suitor;
The wind stirs from the depths
Foaming waves!
Soul of man,
How much you resemble the water!
Fate of man,
how much you resemble the wind.