The Rudolf Steiner Archive

20. Esotericism in Goethe's Works

My dear friends!

[ 1 ] On January 29, 1827, Goethe said to his friend Eckermann about the second part of Faust, which was already well underway at the time:

But everything is indeed sensuous, and, as conceived for the stage, will appeal to everyone. And that is all I intended. If only the audience takes pleasure in the spectacle; the initiated will at the same time not fail to grasp the deeper meaning, just as is the case with The Magic Flute and other works.

[ 2 ] In this way, Goethe expressed that he himself allowed a deeper meaning to be discerned in his works. It is well known that discussions of Goethe’s deeper worldview are met with the objection: “You yourselves are reading all sorts of things into the works that Goethe never intended.” This objection could easily be refuted. Only someone who is unwilling to apply all their spiritual powers to uncover the meaning of poetry can say that. We wish to counter all these objections with what Goethe said in his conversation with Eckermann. Goethe strikes us as one of those artistic figures who did not allow himself to be inspired by the caprice of the imagination or the randomness of external experience, but rather strove to recognize and explore the great enigmatic questions of existence. Goethe was a serious and profound seeker. The direction of his quest is already evident in his very earliest childhood inclinations. Nowhere is this direction more powerfully evident to us than in what Goethe told us about the time when he was seven years old. He took the finest minerals and rocks from his father’s natural history collection and arranged them in a regular pattern on a music stand. This was the altar on which he intended to offer his sacrifices to the God of Nature. At the very top, he placed incense sticks, which he lit with the help of a magnifying glass using the rays of the rising morning sun. For him, these natural products were the very means through which the divine primal forces of nature expressed themselves. Through the captured rays of the morning sun, he had kindled a natural fire—a sacred fire—through the very essence of nature’s divine forces. In this way, he sought to offer a sacrifice to the God of Nature; thus he wished to draw closer to the great God of Nature. Goethe’s entire spiritual relationship to the cosmos is expressed in this childlike manner. At a higher level, the young Goethe’s conviction reappears when he was already active in Weimar, in his prose hymn “Nature”:

Nature! We are surrounded and embraced by her—unable to step out of her, and unable to penetrate deeper into her. Uninvited and without warning, she draws us into the circle of her dance and carries us along until we grow weary and slip from her arms.

[ 3 ] He then addresses all the entities of nature, as they are manifestations of the spirit that hovers within nature. Finally, he says:

She brought me in; she will lead me out as well. I put my trust in her. She may do with me as she pleases. She will not hate her work. I was not speaking of her. No, whatever is true and whatever is false—she has spoken it all. Everything is her fault, and everything is to her credit.

[ 4 ] And before that, it says:

With just a few sips from the cup of love, she is spared a life of hardship.

[ 5 ] After his student years in Leipzig, Goethe had a profound inner experience: while confined to his sickbed, he came to understand the seriousness of life. In Frankfurt, he then undertook all sorts of unusual studies with friends and immersed himself in various mystical and alchemical works. He associated with people who were engaged in mysticism, who sought God and Christ within themselves. Then, in Strasbourg, he met that other great mind, Herder, at whose side his profound appreciation for nature first dawned upon him—an appreciation that later found expression in his scientific studies and writings. After Goethe moved to Weimar, we often find him, like a student, over in Jena, attending the lectures of Loder and other scholars in order to draw closer to the divine power in nature. He always sees in everything that manifests itself materially an outflow of the spirit. Already in Strasbourg, a book by a materialistic French encyclopedist had come into his hands. It made a great impression on him. He says of it in Poetry and Truth:

Just think how hollow and empty we felt in that dreary, atheistic twilight. [...] Matter was supposed to exist from eternity, and to have been in motion from eternity, and was now supposed to produce, through this motion—to the right, to the left, and in all directions, without further ado—the infinite phenomena of existence.

[ 6 ] Then continue:

But he knew as little about nature as we do: for, having established a few general concepts, he immediately abandons them in order to transform that which is higher than nature—or which appears as a higher nature within nature—into material, heavy nature—which, though in motion, is nevertheless directionless and formless—and believes he has thereby gained quite a great deal.

[ 7 ] This is a criticism that Goethe could also level at today’s materialistic science. Anyone who delves deeply into Goethe’s work will soon realize that when Goethe spoke about nature, he spoke from great depths, from the spirit we call the theosophical worldview. It was in the fourteenth century that this was already being cultivated within the Rosicrucian movement. Nothing reliable has been reported about it by those outside the movement. What truly pertains to it was known only to the initiates.

[ 8 ] There is a poem by Goethe, “The Secrets,” in which a character arrives at a kind of monastery and encounters a gathering of enlightened individuals there, twelve in number. A thirteenth is with them, who is on his deathbed. His twelve brothers speak of him in the most beautiful and appreciative terms. They then recount some of the traits of this great man, who stands there as a connoisseur of the world. It is said that even as a boy he had already killed the otter, which symbolizes the overcoming of the lower nature. Then, after many meaningful words, the following lines follow:

From the force that binds all beings,
The person who overcomes themselves is set free.

[ 9 ] Goethe portrays someone who has overcome himself in this poem, “The Secrets.” The entire situation into which the brother—to whom this great figure is described—is led appears to the initiated as the Grail or Parzival situation. Goethe was unable to complete the poem; the subject matter was too vast. He once gave a student an explanation of it. It alludes to a fellowship of enlightened beings who have joined together to form a brotherhood. Each represents one of the world’s great religious systems. The great emissaries of these systems are united in a brotherhood, where one of the leaders must be the one who perceives the unity and the core of wisdom within the religions. What Goethe says here could be made the guiding principle of the Theosophical Movement. Goethe is pointing here to what every initiate knows: that there is a secret society. Goethe has the newcomer at the gate already glimpse the mysterious symbol: the cross entwined with roses. Goethe wanted to point out that there is such a mystery within the modern world, just as there have been such initiates in all ages.

[ 10 ] Goethe continued his search for God as an artist during his journey through Italy. He sought God in the universe, in all its creations, which exude divine grandeur; he also sought Him in the creations of humankind, in art, which to him was a continuation of nature. On September 6, 1787, he wrote in the diary of his Italian journey:

These sublime works of art are, at the same time, the highest works of nature, brought forth by human beings in accordance with true and natural laws. Everything arbitrary and imaginary falls away; there is necessity, there is God.

[ 11 ] Goethe says of Greek art:

I suspect that they acted according to the very same laws that govern nature—the ones I am trying to uncover.

[ 12 ] He beautifully expresses the connection between humanity and nature in his book on Winckelmann:

When the healthy nature of human beings functions as a whole, when they feel at home in the world as part of a great, beautiful, dignified, and valuable whole, when harmonious contentment grants them pure, unbridled delight—then the universe, if it could perceive itself, would exult at having reached its goal and marvel at the pinnacle of its own becoming and being. For what purpose does all the effort of suns and planets and moons, of stars and Milky Ways, of comets and nebulae, of worlds that have come into being and worlds yet to come, serve, if not ultimately so that a happy human being may rejoice, unaware of his own existence?

[ 13 ] That which lives within human beings, deep within them, as a soul-spiritual entity—that is nature itself, which becomes conscious to human beings within their souls. It was this sentiment that also guided Goethe when he sought to reshape the Faust legend in a new form. This legend expressed what many people felt at that time. The medieval Faust depicts a person who seeks to recognize the divine in nature itself. In the Middle Ages, seeking the divine in nature was regarded as a departure from the divine. The divine was sought only in the religious text of the Bible. On one side stood the Faust legend—Faust, who seeks the divine in nature and makes a pact with the devil—and on the other side stood Luther, who hurls an inkwell at the devil’s head, as the legend recounts. Faust falls prey to the devil; he became a man of the world and a physician who sought to recognize the great God in nature. In the Middle Ages, such people were called “sons of the devil.” Goethe introduces something new into the Faust concept; his leitmotif is:

Whoever strives with all their might—we can save them!

[ 14 ] A person who strives to seek the sources of nature, who seeks the spirit of nature, must reach his goal. Goethe is serious about this interpretation. Where a person not only seeks the spiritual and the soulful within himself, but where he rises to the realization that everything around us is animated, there he is on the right path. When we consider human beings, we [must say that, for example,] our finger is [only] conceivable as a part of our entire organism. Human beings live under the illusion of the personal self because they succumb to the notion that they are independent and self-sufficient, rather than a part of the entire earthly organism. But if raised several miles above the Earth, a human being could [no longer] live; he would [miserably suffocate], wither away, just like the finger of my hand if it were cut off. Goethe recognizes the Earth organism. There is a profound insight in this when he has Faust penetrate to the sources of life and characterizes the spirit of the Earth with the words:

In the tides of life, in the storm of deeds
I surge back and forth,
Weaving to and fro!
Birth and grave,
An eternal sea,
A shifting weave,
A blazing life,
Thus, at the whirring loom of time,
I weave a living garment for the Deity.

[ 15 ] Goethe demonstrates how deeply he has immersed himself in the spirit of the cosmos—how he senses and feels that spirit in the cosmos, just as it lives in the human heart—when, elsewhere, he has Faust converse with that very same earth spirit. There we recognize that Goethe sees the same activity in every tree and every plant as he does in human beings:

Sublime Spirit, you gave me, gave me everything,
That I asked for. You did not turn your face toward me in the fire for nothing.
You gave me the magnificent natural world as my kingdom,
The power to feel it, to enjoy it. You do not
Merely allow me to be a cold, marveling visitor,
But grant me to gaze into its deep bosom,
As into the bosom of a friend.
You lead the procession of the living
Past me, and teach me to know my brothers
In the quiet thicket, in air and water.
And when the storm roars and creaks in the forest,
The giant spruce, toppling, strikes down neighboring branches
And crushes neighboring trunks as it crashes down,
And the hill thunders with a dull, hollow roar at its fall,
Then you lead me to the safe cave, show
Me to myself, and within my own breast
Secret, profound wonders open up.

[ 16 ] We will find theosophical ideas in Goethe, in a casual way.

[ 17 ] There is talk of Pythagorean celestial music. At higher stages of human development, there are experiences that are similar for a person to those of someone born blind who, after a successful operation, regains his sight—only much more magnificent and awe-inspiring. Such a spiritual “operation” exists. Through it, we come to know of things and beings that are all around us in the world. The world of the spirit—of which Fichte spoke to his audience in 1813—then opens up to us. He says: A new sense is required for this. When one speaks to people about these worlds, those who speak often find themselves in the same situation as a sighted person among a group of people born blind, to whom he speaks of color, brilliance, and light. Everything said theosophically about this spiritual world is entirely in keeping with Fichte’s thinking. The theosophist does not speak of an afterlife. How many worlds we perceive around us depends on how many faculties we possess for perceiving these worlds. As more and more dormant abilities within us are awakened, so many new worlds open up to us. For people of the present day, there is first a level of consciousness through which they take in sensory and outwardly perceptible things. Then there is another level of consciousness for those who attain the ability of higher vision. There, a new world of color, radiance, and light opens up before their inner eye. This world is called the astral world. An even higher world can be perceived when one attains the continuity of consciousness, where the manifestations of a higher world reveal themselves in a form known as sounds. The Devachanic world is a world of sound. This world is then carried over into everyday consciousness, so that one can perceive it even while walking among everyday objects, among tables and chairs. Thus, the Theosophical worldview speaks of a world of the soul—the astral world—and of a Devachanic world—the world of the spirit—which are perceptible to those whose spiritual eyes and ears are open. Where Goethe places Faust between the forces of good and evil, he has the following words resound:

The sun resounds in the ancient way
A contest of songs in the realms of the gods,
And its prescribed journey
It completes with a thunderous roar.

[ 18 ] When most people say that this is a poetic image, they misunderstand the poet if they believe he is merely offering a phrase. A true poet does not do that. The physical sun does not make a sound. But if we regard the sun as the expression of a spiritual organism, then we can say that the sun makes a sound. In the second part of Faust, Goethe places him in a similar situation again. There it says:

Listen! Hear the storm of the Horae!
Resounding to the ears of the spirit
The new day is already dawning.
Rock gates creak and rattle,
Phoebus’ wheels roll with a crackle,
What a din the light brings!
It drums, it trumpets,
The eye blinks and the ear is astonished,
The unheard cannot be heard.

[ 19 ] Goethe draws from the depths of life’s wisdom. Anyone who does not know that Goethe sought to draw from the sources of esoteric wisdom has a poor understanding of Goethe. He himself said that the deeper meaning of his poetry would not remain hidden.

[ 20 ] The second part of Faust has remained a major problem for people, partly because Faust is accompanied by Mephistopheles, the representative of the forces of evil. Goethe scholars have also written endlessly about Mephistopheles. The word is a compound of “Mephis”—meaning “corruptor”—and “Tophel”—meaning “liar.” This simultaneously suggests that Goethe was able to draw from sources where precisely this meaning of Mephistopheles could be found. It is in the second part of Faust that we truly come to know the esoteric Goethe. People have reflected particularly deeply on the Homunculus. Some interpreters of Faust suggest that the Homunculus represents humanistic scholarship. Likewise, one can see Faust scholars grappling with what appears as the “Mothers.”

[ 21 ] Occult teachings have always distinguished between the physical, soul, and spiritual natures of human beings. Today’s materialistic science also considers the physical nature. The world of the soul belongs to what we have characterized as the astral realm. The spirit belongs to the Devachanic world. As in all mysticism, for Goethe, too, the physical body is the transitory. The soul is that which forms the connection between what is transitory in time and the spiritually eternal. For Goethe, the human being is also composed of three parts: body, soul, and spirit. For those who thus consider the structure of human nature, what happens when a human being enters this world? They come from the eternal sphere of Devachan. The primordial source of spiritual existence is referred to as the “Mothers.” With the Mothers lies the threefold primordial source of the human being. The spirit corresponds to the eternal. The soul also has an eternal archetype. Theosophy has designated these with the Sanskrit terms: Atma, Budhi, Manas. This is referred to as the divine primordial trinity that resides with the Mothers, of which the human being is a threefold image. Goethe seeks to depict this—the way in which the threefold nature of the human being is composed of spirit, soul, and body. A figure from long ago is to stand before Faust: Helena. The example of Helena is meant to illustrate the development of humanity. The reappearance of the spirit in a new form is to be shown there. The three aspects of the human being are to come together again there.

[ 22 ] Goethe depicts the soul itself through the homunculus; it is the astral body of the human being, and it longs for embodiment. The spirit must be added to this; it resides with the Mothers. Goethe, in fact, describes the journey to the Mothers in a very precise manner. Mephisto says to him as Faust enters the realm of the Mothers:

Then sink! I might as well say: rise!

[ 23 ] There is no difference between above and below in Devachan. Then he shows him the tripod, which points the way to the Mothers, representing the threefold nature of man. Faust succeeds in summoning the spirit of the deceased Helena back up. Faust is not yet ready to fully understand this. When he tries to embrace Helena passionately, an explosion follows.

[ 24 ] The homunculus is created; this is precisely the human astral body. This astral body is to receive a physical body. Goethe has him led down to the ancient Greek philosophers. He wants the “tangibly effective” for the astral soul. Now he is to learn from the Greek philosophers how one can come into being and develop. The entire process of development is then described—through the mineral and plant kingdoms, all the way up to the human being. The passage through the plant kingdom is characterized by an apt expression: “It rumbles like that.” Finally, we see the possibility emerge for the body to unite with the soul as Eros arrives. Homunculus shatters against Galatea’s shell chariot; he is no longer a spirit—he has united with the elements.

[ 25 ] In this great epic poem, we see how Goethe embodied his worldview within it. Goethe describes his worldview in yet another way in the fairy tale of the green snake and the beautiful lily. The very way in which the “fairy tale” came into being should make it clear that what is expressed here is indeed possible. During the period of friendship between Goethe and Schiller, the “Letters on Aesthetic Education” appeared, like a kind of morning gift. Schiller asked Goethe to contribute. Goethe wrote back that he could not express what he had to say in a philosophical manner, but that he would convey it through imagery. So he wrote that fairy tale about the green snake and the beautiful lily. If we wish to understand what Goethe meant by the “fairy tale,” we need only read what Schiller wrote to Goethe at the time. Schiller sees in the realm of beautiful appearance—in the realm of artistic appearance—an intermediate realm that lifts human beings out of the realm of necessity, of sensuous nature, and into inner freedom. He sees in the artist the person who finds the spiritual within the physical, so that the sensuous is spiritualized. In this way, human beings can rise above the sensuous world through art. Art is a means for him to purify and spiritualize human instincts. A person may follow these instincts only when they have been so purified that they no longer conflict with the spirit—so that the person has no choice but to desire the ideal. Goethe depicts this in a grand image, one drawn from infinite depths. In the will-o’-the-wisps in the “Fairy Tale,” which cross a river and must promise the ferryman to pay for their passage with three onions, three artichokes, and three heads of cabbage, we recognize the lower self of human beings—the “I” nature—which possesses within its potential the threefold, higher, future nature, namely the nature of wisdom or Manas, the benevolent nature or Budhi, piety, and the nature of power or Atma, strength. We call the development of the human being toward this higher trinity “initiation,” which is carried out in the Mysteries. Gradually, in the great course of human development, all people will become initiates.

[ 26 ] In all esoteric traditions, “water” refers to the astral world.

O human soul, how you resemble water!

[ 27 ] says Goethe. There are two kinds of human natures: one that acquires wisdom out of selfishness, and the other that acquires wisdom through hard work, moving from one experience to the next. If the astral—the river—is to accept the gold, the wisdom acquired out of vanity, then it will burst forth. In esotericism, the primordial is represented by lotus flowers, by something shell-like that can be peeled away, leaving a seed. The will-o’-the-wisps represent the human ego that merely wants to shine; the serpent represents the human ego that identifies itself with wisdom. Goethe once said:

If the eye were not like the sun
How could we see the light?

[ 28 ] When the serpent glows from within, it may enter the temple where humanity attains the three highest goods, represented by three kings: wisdom, piety, or beauty and strength. The old man with the lamp represents the way in which most people are enlightened today. Religion is symbolized by the old man’s wife. The beautiful lily signifies the Eternal, which a person can attain only after being purified. The Supreme slays all living things that approach it while still immature. But through mystical death, a person attains the highest spiritual gifts. Goethe has woven the deepest truths of esotericism into this fairy tale. In it, he has shown how a person attains the highest goods of humanity by sacrificing his lower nature. The same idea is expressed in the verse found in the West-Eastern Divan, in the poem that begins:

Tell no one—only the wise,
For the crowd will mock you at once.

[ 29 ] There, at the end, he speaks of the sacrifice of the lower nature and the spiritual rebirth of humankind:

And as long as you don't have that,
This: Die and Be Reborn!
You are but a gloomy guest
On this dark earth.