The Rudolf Steiner Archive

28. About “Pandora”

[ 1 ] Today we will hear more about Goethe’s dramatic fragment “Pandora.” If I were to give you an exhaustive account of it, I would have to give several lectures. [Especially with this particular work by Goethe, it will always only be possible to make a few remarks about how the poet himself experienced the figure of Pandora as living forces within himself.] I can only gently hint at the meaning of the individual figures that the poet felt within himself, as it were, as living forces. Anyone who delves into the drama from this perspective will gain a sense that it simply cannot be otherwise than that these forces were at work within the poet’s own soul. In the last lecture, we saw how Goethe powerfully contrasted the two figures of Prometheus and Epimetheus. [In the pre-earthly era, these two figures—as the poet portrayed them as human beings—were creative powers, spiritual powers.] Even in individual words of the drama, one can sense that creative powers lived within Goethe. Spiritual powers had, so to speak, taken the place of human ones—powers that originated in the pre-earthly lunar era. You can imagine that those beings, the Angeloi, went through their human stage under entirely different conditions. To go through the stage as we do today requires precisely the conditions that now exist on Earth. They also had to pass through a state of consciousness quite different from the one we have now. But it would be quite difficult to describe those peculiar storms of consciousness that those beings experienced who lived on the ancient Moon and completed their human stage there. [It was a very peculiar form of consciousness that those beings on the ancient Moon possessed as human beings.] At that time, human beings had only a dim, image-based consciousness. Those beings who were human at that time, of course, had a higher level of consciousness than we do, and our present consciousness cannot be compared to the former lunar consciousness. [The consciousness of these beings on the ancient Moon is preserved in the states of consciousness of the beings who remained there.] It was also an object-oriented consciousness, but on a much higher level. Had those beings on the ancient Moon clung to their consciousness and entered into earthly conditions with it, they would not have been able to live there at all. That is why those beings had to withdraw into a higher sphere when the actual development of the Earth began. They had to, so to speak, forgo the Earth’s development. Had they not done so, they would have been unable to perceive earthly conditions on Earth at all. They would merely have experienced what remained within them as a legacy of the old lunar conditions. Nor would they have been able to intervene in the course of earthly events. The fact that they were truly able to intervene is due to the circumstance that they renounced the fruits of Earth’s development and remained on a higher level. Their consciousness had been radically transformed into a reflective consciousness. Had the Elohim not remained above but descended to Earth, they would have become Epimethean in nature. Human beings still retain a part of what they had become on a higher plane. This aspect of their development manifests itself everywhere in their lives. Human beings are, in a sense, subject to the tragedy of seeing things in hindsight that would have turned out differently had they been able to see them beforehand.

[ 2 ] It has long been common knowledge that Ibsen, for example—who is revered today as a great poet—failed his high school graduation exam. This is just one instance of a curious occurrence. Or you need only let the magnificent example of that irony from the University Professors’ Day sink in, and you will see that this Epimethean moment is not an isolated case. Should we support high school students with goodwill, or not? Those professors admitted that they had no means whatsoever of recognizing the talents of such people.

[ 3 ] This Epimethean element is what humans have inherited from the Elohim. But now human beings have also mastered the other side—namely, they have attained the ability to rise, to a greater or lesser extent, in forward-looking consciousness, which receives its impulses from what is already anticipated as the future. This case is quite rare in school, as you know from experience. This Promethean element could only gradually flow into our being, and the Epimethean element gradually dried up. [Through the Promethean element, we now have two currents: one that is slowly drying up—the Epimethean—and one that is slowly rising—the Promethean.] However, people have not yet made much progress in the former capacity. Yet these two spiritual currents are essential for us. [As an example of how this slowly rising current will take shape within humanity, we see that there are already things today that people can approach objectively, without personal emotions:] In science, solar and lunar eclipses can be calculated in advance. Thus, in matters of mathematics, human beings are Promethean. Here, the passions fall silent, and truth alone speaks. In all things mathematical, therefore, foresight is possible. Mathematics is the clear, unambiguous, and luminous beginning of the Promethean element. This had to develop at a certain pace, and this was brought about by the fact that the leader of this element did not descend to our Earth too early. He had to wait, by the highest decree, until the point in time when conditions were such that he could descend as Prometheus. That Prometheus of whom the myth speaks descended to humanity too soon; therefore, on the gods’ orders, he was chained to the rock. But he knew the secret that another would come after him, who would then be the true Prometheus. Prometheus also knew the secret that Zeus would one day be overthrown. But the Prometheus who gradually allows the impulse of foresighted consciousness to take effect within humanity is the Christ. [Christ is also the one who will then overthrow Zeus.] Prometheus conceals his secret from Zeus, who had him chained to the Caucasus. [In the present, the two work together.]

[ 4 ] Thus, Goethe’s drama stands at the very heart of everything we know about the development of the world. One element propels us forward; the other connects us to what is to be brought forward.

[ 5 ] [So we can say: Yes], a being has descended among humankind that one must allow to enter one’s soul more and more deeply; [that is the Christ]. One must, however, take one’s time with this and always keep in mind what may still come from above. [Another part of humanity, however, will take its time in receiving the Christ; it will receive him as more than a gift from above—this is where those beings have remained who have not become Epimetheuses.] Thus, what a person is permitted to receive within themselves must flow together with what comes from higher regions. With these words, “Pandora” comes to a close!

[ 6 ] This shows you just how deep the wells are from which we must draw the emotions needed to understand such poetry. Only the theosophical school of thought teaches us to properly understand humanity’s greatest treasures. But this movement also shows us that what truly leads us forward lies with the gods in the spiritual world, from where it must be drawn in order to be united with what slumbers within the human soul.

[ 7 ] What the poets bring us is a gift from above, and we must combine it with what we have within ourselves. The poet gives us the Epimethean, and we, in turn, offer him the Promethean drawn from spiritual science. [Those who embrace theosophy will become Prometheans. Those who wish to be graced from above will become Epimetheans. The Promethean element must have become the property of humanity when, three thousand years from the present, the Maitreya Buddha appears on Earth.]