The Rudolf Steiner Archive

4. Truths of Spiritual Research

[ 1 ] Ladies and gentlemen! For a number of years, I have had the privilege of speaking from this venue on topics related to spiritual research. That this spiritual research, as understood here, is very well aware that there are various objections to what has been said here—not only minor objections, but also substantial ones—is what I attempted to demonstrate last winter in two lectures I gave here on “How Does One Refute Spiritual Science?” and “How Does One Justify Spiritual Science?” While my intention at that time was to discuss the pros and cons more from the standpoint of general scientific rigor, the lectures today and the day after tomorrow—which belong together and form a whole—will focus more on presenting the pros and cons directly from the standpoint of the spiritual researcher, as it were, from the standpoint of experience. Thus, these two lectures will focus less on specific questions and more on the manner in which one arrives at the truths of spiritual science and on the sources of error that, as it were, stand at the very threshold of these truths—both for the researcher himself and for those who wish to approach these truths or insights and make them an integral part of their inner life.

[ 2 ] It might seem peculiar at first glance that one could speak of numerous sources of error in a field of research that deals precisely with the most significant questions of human life—both the life of the individual and the life of human civilization as a whole. After all, it is the questions concerning the nature of the human soul, the nature and purpose of the whole human being, the experiences of the soul after death, questions about death and immortality, about repeated earthly lives, and so on, that are the subject of spiritual research— that is, questions connected with the most intimate and highest aspects of human life—questions regarding which human beings have a hope and a need that as little error as possible should creep into the answers to these questions. It is therefore all the more necessary to speak of the paths of truth and the paths of error in order to truly shed light on these questions.

[ 3 ] When we speak of spiritual research, its truths, and its errors, I ask you, distinguished audience, to bear in mind that we will initially be concerned only with the methods of this spiritual research—that is, with the discovery of truths about spiritual life. And one of the most fundamental truths that must be recognized from the outset is that a spiritual researcher must possess a sound inner life in every respect. This is not to say that the results of spiritual research—or the guidance it is able to offer based on its sources—could be beneficial only to a healthy soul. That is not the claim at all. On the contrary, these findings have a healing quality—something that can set not only a soul that has strayed but also a diseased spiritual life on the right path, and which then extends to the healing of the entire human life. This, then, should be clear from the outset. If today we are to speak primarily of a healthy inner life as the true source of spiritual research, this means that one can attain the truths—the genuine insights—in the spiritual realm only through a healthy inner life. What spiritual science is then able to offer can, to the greatest extent, be called a remedy for the human soul.

[ 4 ] A healthy spiritual life—that is the prerequisite. Why? A healthy spiritual life is necessary for this very reason: because the sources of spiritual research lie within the human soul itself, and because one can only glimpse the hidden spiritual reasons for existence if one makes one’s own soul an instrument, a tool of spiritual research. And it is easy to see that health can only come to light when the soul—which seeks to journey into the spiritual worlds—is itself healthy.

[ 5 ] To avoid beating around the bush, let us take as our starting point something that has already been touched upon here on several occasions. If the human soul is to be made into an instrument for looking into the spiritual world, then it is necessary that the soul forces—which are fully sufficient for a person’s everyday life—be increased in strength, as it were condensed and substantially strengthened. In ordinary daily life, and also in the realm to which external science is devoted, human beings deal only with what their senses teach them and what the intellect—which is bound to the instrument of the physical brain—perceives. We know even from a trivial observation of life that both the perceptions of the external senses and the ordinary human intellect fall silent when a person enters the state of sleep. Our daily life, after all, unfolds between waking and sleeping. We then perceive that our senses gradually fail as we enter the state of sleep, that the entire instrument of our body passes into a motionless, tranquil state, and that we enter a state of unconsciousness, surrounded by darkness. Now, it would certainly violate the usual rules of logic to believe that what a person experiences in their soul from morning to evening were, so to speak, subject to annihilation every night, and that the next morning everything that ebbs and flows in the life of the soul would arise anew. All of this is undoubtedly present from the moment of falling asleep until waking up. It is not because of sleep that the experiences of the day are absent from our inner life at night, but because a person’s spiritual powers are not strong enough to perceive themselves during sleep. And it is easy to see that everything depends on whether a person is capable of bringing into consciousness that which is unconscious during sleep.

[ 6 ] If we can perceive what normally becomes unconscious within us during sleep—if we can perceive when our senses are silent, when our brain is not called upon to perform its function—then it is possible for us to have an experience through that part of ourselves that is independent of the body. And this experience can then already reveal to us what kind of experience it is—whether it is spiritual and supersensible or not. That is to say, in order for the soul to become an instrument for perceiving in a way other than through the instrument of the body, it is necessary to bring about a state that is similar to sleep and yet, at the same time, entirely opposite to it. In this respect, even when the soul is to become an instrument for other kinds of perception, ordinary sensory perception must be shut off. But—and this is what constitutes the opposite—unconsciousness must not set in; that is, we must bring about a state that is similar to the state of sleep and yet different from it, for full consciousness must be present.

[ 7 ] Such a state can be brought about in various ways. The healthiest way to achieve it is through the methods described in my book *How to Gain Insight into the Higher Worlds*, the basic principles of which I will at least briefly outline here.

[ 8 ] This state is brought about by the inner workings of the human soul, through mental efforts that we do not make in everyday life. It is referred to as concentration of thought, of the inner life of imagination, of feeling, or also as meditation. Let us now cite an example that has been mentioned before—an example that at first glance seems strange, but we will soon see why it appears so paradoxical. The point is that, in order to achieve the desired state, we must evoke very specific mental images in our soul and relate to these images in a very specific way. Take, for example, the idea—as I said, it is paradoxical—that we have two glasses in front of us, one half-filled with water, the other completely empty. Now let’s imagine that we pour a little water from the half-filled glass into the empty one, and that by pouring from the fuller glass, it does not become emptier, but instead becomes fuller and fuller. That, isn’t it, is a completely paradoxical idea. However, one must not merely hold this idea and mull it over in one’s consciousness; rather, one must associate a very specific meaning with this idea—only then will it become, in the true and proper sense, a concentration of thought, a meditation.

[ 9 ] We are all familiar with a reality that permeates every aspect of our lives, yet whose depths are extraordinarily difficult to fathom. That is love in its various forms. Love has the peculiarity that the lover, as it were, pours out his whole heart to another person, yet in doing so does not become poorer, but rather ever richer, ever fuller. This is the mystery of love: the more of it is given away, the more meaningful and richer the human soul becomes. Love is something so complex, something so profound, that we can ever only grasp a few of its aspects, but its essence is unfathomable. Yet this one aspect of love—that by giving of itself, it makes the soul ever richer and richer—can be symbolized for us by the image of the two glasses we have just spoken of. In this regard, when it comes to a moral experience in life, we do the same thing that we do, for example, in geometry.

[ 10 ] Let’s imagine a medal that is circular in shape, made of some substance whose nature we cannot initially fathom. If we then draw a circle with the curvature of the medal’s shape, we can study everything that relates to a circle, and this then also applies to what we have before us as reality. The geometer uses his figures to create symbols of reality. In the same way, the soul can create symbols of the eternal, provided it is clear that these are nothing more than symbols.

[ 11 ] So if we have an image such as that of the two glasses—pouring water from the half-full glass into the empty one, and the glass from which the liquid is poured becoming full— and if, deep within our soul, there lives the sense that this image relates to such a significant phenomenon of life as love, then we process this image in the proper sense when we try, through a strong effort of will, to shut out all perceptions that come from the senses. Just as one sees all images fade away when falling asleep, so one deliberately shuts out everything that comes from the outside and everything the mind can conceive, and all the powers of the soul are concentrated on this one image.

[ 12 ] Of course, it is not enough to do this just once; rather, with patience and perseverance, one must subject the soul to such exercises again and again with the utmost energy, and then there will gradually be a strengthening, a gathering, and a condensation of the soul’s powers. And then it happens that, through the inner experience of such soul experiences, we become aware that a point in time arrives when we no longer need to bring such images, such symbolic representations, before our soul; rather, such images gradually emerge of their own accord from the deep, hidden depths of our soul life.

[ 13 ] If one wishes to perform these exercises, it is better to use images that are truly only symbols—that is, that do not refer to any external reality. One could also use ordinary images, but they are not as effective. If someone were to object that it is rather foolish to imagine something that is not there at all—it must be said: This work of concentration is not intended to depict the external reality of ordinary everyday life, but rather to educate the soul, to draw out from it powers that are otherwise dormant. This exercise is not intended to recognize truths, my esteemed audience. It would be a mistake to think that one could directly recognize truths through such exercises. It is a matter of educating the soul, of drawing hidden powers from it.

[ 14 ] When the moment has come for these images to arise in the soul, the spiritual researcher’s soul must be brought into a very specific mood, a very specific state, through systematic spiritual training. When we speak of this state of mind in which the soul must be when these images arise of their own accord, it must be pointed out that, to the layperson who knows nothing of the whole matter, this world of images appears to be precisely what is described as visions, hallucinations, and other manifestations of a pathological mental state. Anyone familiar with some of the findings of today’s fringe sciences—those situated between physiology and psychology—can very easily come to the conclusion—and this is, after all, an objection that is raised time and again—that the spiritual researcher artificially trains himself to achieve what a diseased soul experiences when it has visions, hallucinations, delusions, and so on.

[ 15 ] Now, it is precisely through the training of the soul—which we can only touch upon today—that this soul is led to distinguish precisely between all that may be visions and the like, and the characterized symbolic images that, according to the custom of spiritual science, are called the imaginative world. The spiritual researcher learns to distinguish precisely between these two worlds. For what is absolutely necessary for success is to make the soul as averse as possible—and as immune as possible—to all delusions, hallucinations, and the like. Recognizing them in their true nature is an essential part of spiritual training.

[ 16 ] And here we would like to point out a significant distinction right away. Visions, delusions, and so on all have something in common: they overwhelm the soul; they possess something that demands the strongest belief. We know from everyday life that it is easier to dissuade a person who is subject to visions or delusions from believing some fact of external life than it is to dissuade them from their delusions. When one brings up their delusions, they may, under certain circumstances, come up with the most astute justifications for their illusions. What is thus directly connected to a pathological state of mind is an insurmountable belief in these soul experiences. What the spiritual researcher, however, must achieve is absolute disbelief in the world of the imagination. Although he has summoned these images into his soul and must regard them as desirable, they initially count for nothing to him—they cannot provide him with truth in the objective sense. And his greatest error would be to regard what he has achieved there as something that relates to an external reality. He must train himself—precisely through strong spiritual and volitional powers—to have absolutely no belief in this imaginative world, so that the soul initially immerses itself in a world of images that are not an expression of any objective reality.

[ 17 ] What, then, do they express? They are merely an expression of the inner life. Through this world of images, one initially comes to know nothing other than one’s own inner life. And one must not even attempt to see anything else in it other than an outpouring of one’s own inner life. This is the essence of what the soul must attain.

[ 18 ] So if, on the path to spiritual research, one wishes to compare what an imagination is with a vision, a hallucination, and so on, one must say: a vision or a hallucination overwhelms a person; it demands an almost insurmountable belief in the objectivity of that vision; in contrast, in the case of imagination, the spiritual researcher is aware that he himself is the creator of what stands before his soul as an image.

[ 19 ] He must pass through this state. He must draw a rich, imaginative world from within himself in order to simultaneously gain the awareness that it is nothing other than a mirror of his own soul. This awareness can sometimes be quite unsettling, for the world into which one immerses oneself is like a second world—a world full of beauty and grandeur, a world full of bliss. But people who immerse themselves in such a world easily become angry when one tries to instill in them doubts about the objectivity of this world, for life is good within it. Yet it is precisely this good life that must be overcome. What actually happens in this world? If we are to describe it, we can compare it to a phenomenon of everyday life.

[ 20 ] Just imagine, my dear listeners, if at this very moment you had to hold in your soul all the thoughts you have ever had—if all of that were in your soul right now—it would be impossible to live with it. The soul needs to forget, to store away these images, to push these experiences down into an indeterminate depth of the soul. From there, we can bring them back up into memory. Just as these images sink into oblivion in ordinary life, so must the spiritual researcher, through the training of the will, be able to push his entire imaginative life—this whole sum, this new world in which he so gladly dwells and which brings him such bliss —this is what the person must push down into oblivion through a strong act of will, so that, as it were, like a being diving beneath the water, this entire imaginative world is submerged in the life of the soul, as if it were not there. And again and again, more and more often, the spiritual researcher must submerge this imaginative world into the depths of the subconscious, into the depths of the soul’s life, of which he initially knows nothing at all. Then he must again bring about moments in which he excludes all external perceptions, including thought; he must bring about moments in which the soul is completely empty—thinking nothing, feeling nothing, remembering nothing, worrying about nothing, and experiencing no emotions or the like. Then the imaginations that have been sent down into the unconscious gradually rise back up. The images return, but not as they were before—rather, they are entirely different. They appear in such a way that one knows, just as with external sensory perceptions: these are not fantasies, but expressions of reality. Faced with these images that are now emerging, one has the immediate awareness that they are expressions of reality.

[ 21 ] What, then, has one actually accomplished by undergoing this process? One has strengthened the innermost core of one’s soul life to such an extent that this soul life has, as it were, brought its image-forming capacity to full bloom. And what one has brought forth, one has sacrificed, surrendered, detached from oneself, and torn from oneself. One has, as it were, torn one’s soul’s blood from oneself, handed it over to the world, and receives it back again. Just as one extends a hand in the physical world, touches something, and thereby gains knowledge of what one has touched, so one extends one’s soul forces, sends them out from oneself; they connect with the spiritual world, and something returns from the spiritual world.

[ 22 ] The objection has often been raised that one could be succumbing to illusions here, since we know that the soul of sensitive people is capable of perceiving this or that, even when, objectively speaking, nothing is actually there. For example, there are people who perceive the taste of lemonade simply by thinking about it, without actually drinking any. Well, that is certainly true. But nevertheless, a healthy soul will be able to distinguish between a merely imagined lemonade and a real one; one may experience the taste, but one cannot quench one’s thirst with an imagined lemonade. A similar objection is also raised against the idea in Schopenhauer’s philosophy that the world is merely our imagination. I do not wish to disparage Schopenhauer’s philosophy, whose significance I acknowledge—as you can already see from the fact that I myself have edited a Schopenhauer collection. But the trivial objection is nevertheless correct: it states that no matter how vividly one imagines steel that is 1,000 degrees hot, one will still not be able to burn one’s hands on that steel—but one will burn oneself if one touches real steel that is 1,000 degrees Celsius. In life, one can distinguish between fantasy, imagination, and reality. There is no other proof in the sensory world. And so it is in the spiritual world as well. When one enters the spiritual world, what one has sent down into the realm of oblivion returns in a completely different way and is now an expression of those spiritual beings and realities that lie beyond the physical sensory world. One gains concepts that one has not formed oneself. For the concepts one has formed oneself were merely for practice.

[ 23 ] Thus, truths are revealed to us from the spiritual world after the soul has first passed through a world of purely mental—one might say, fantastical—imaginations—not in order to recognize anything, but to educate the soul so that it may become strong enough to perceive what it can perceive only through powers other than those of ordinary soul life. In this way, a heightened capacity for knowledge is attained; the life of the soul becomes more concentrated and intensified. One then lives, so to speak, solely in a world of knowledge. All the images of spiritual beings gained in this way are characterized by an immense sense of reality. They are much more vivid than the impressions of the external sensory world, and yet they do not claim to be believed without further consideration. We shall see shortly how this works.

[ 24 ] But first, it is important to reiterate the following: If the images of this imaginative world—which one has created for oneself—first appear before one has consigned this entire symbolic world to oblivion, then they are ambiguous, oracular; and anyone who believes these ambiguous things so readily, who readily engages with them, is on the wrong path. Even when such images are initially attained through all the means of spiritual scientific training, it is impossible to attribute any truth value to them without further reflection. Only when they return and reveal full clarity are they an expression of the spiritual world.

[ 25 ] It is very commonly believed that spiritual research is something that can be attained so easily, and this gives rise to many objections. For example, it is said: Just how much effort must external science expend, and what must it do to arrive at its results? And then these spiritual researchers come along and want to know everything simply by immersing their souls in the spiritual world. – Well, first of all, no true spiritual researcher will ever claim anything other than what he has actually investigated; and secondly, the inner work of the soul, which has just been briefly outlined, cannot be observed in the same way as the work done in laboratories and observatories, but it is much more intense than the work performed there. The conscientious spiritual researcher will repeatedly respond to such objections by saying: This is mere rhetoric; spiritual scientific insights are truly no easier to attain than those of external science, but are gained through painstaking and gradual effort.

[ 26 ] What has been described here can be undertaken by any soul today, within certain limits, without harm. There are already methods today through which one can enter the spiritual world slowly and gradually—they are described in my book *How Does One Gain Insights into the Higher Worlds?*—so that what might seem frightening if one were to enter too quickly does not occur, but rather one can enter the spiritual world in a calm and serene manner. Furthermore, this path to the knowledge of the truths of spiritual life is, by its very nature, safe and more secure than any other, because consciousness is not, as it were, dulled. We are not lulled to sleep, but rather we are made ever more awake and alert in our soul life. Every step we take, we take with full consciousness—with a much stronger awareness than in everyday life. Therefore, if anyone were to speak of dangers in this genuine spiritual research, it would be only because they are unaware that every step is taken with far greater consciousness than even in everyday life.

[ 27 ] The situation is different, however, when the powers of the soul are not directed toward knowledge but toward something else. And that can happen. We have seen that the path of knowledge in spiritual research is based on concentration, on the intensification and strengthening of the soul’s powers. But if these same powers are not directed toward knowledge—but rather if the will and the emotions are called upon—they can lead to the opposite of imaginative knowledge. And this opposite of imaginative knowledge is found in so-called mediumship, in the medium. There is, in fact, no stronger contrast to the spiritual scientist who enters the spiritual world with heightened consciousness than the medium.

[ 28 ] In the case of the medium, the very forces that must be conscious in the spiritual researcher are pushed down into the sphere of the will and the sphere of the emotions. Consciousness becomes dulled, dimmed, and the result is a certain degree of unconsciousness, or at least a state of drowsiness; the person in question, who channels these forces into his emotional faculties without being fully aware of the very forces through which the spiritual researcher gazes into the spiritual world, will now, as a medium with a drowsy consciousness, undertake certain actions in order to bear witness to the direct influence of the spiritual world in what he speaks or otherwise expresses. This is not to say that spiritual matters cannot come to light through the medium or that things cannot be investigated—of course, only those cases are meant here where any fraud or charlatanism is ruled out. Forces do indeed come to light here that lead us into the very essence of the soul, insofar as that soul is disembodied—for example, after death. But it must be emphasized that the human being, as a spiritual researcher, remains fully in control of himself, whereas the medium becomes dependent on the environment—or rather, allows himself to be made dependent. And even if genuine results that are beyond doubt may occasionally come to light, it must nevertheless be said that such research in this field is only possible if it is conducted with absolute mastery of all relevant laws. For here one does indeed venture into dangerous territory that external science cannot approach and therefore stares at it with a layman’s gaze. Mediumship is, in fact, the antithesis of imaginative cognition. But within certain limits, as just mentioned, it is possible to convince a wider audience of something that is difficult to communicate. Important insights can indeed be brought to light in this way, and it must certainly be recognized as significant when someone ventures into this field. Those who wish to learn more about this are referred to the book *The Mystery of Man* by Ludwig Deinhard, as well as to the treatise *The Cardinal Question of Humanity* by Hofrat Seiling. As mentioned, these matters are indeed significant. But at the same time, one must not overlook the fact that the path to truth in this direction must be paved with all possible necessary precautions.

[ 29 ] Thus we see that, on the path to a higher capacity for knowledge, a person first gains a more intense and active consciousness than in ordinary life. But we also see that the opposite of this occurs in mediumship, where spiritual forces act directly upon the human being, so that when a person is a medium, they speak or write with a subdued consciousness under the guidance of the spirit world. It is not through any definitions, but by describing things as they are, as they are experienced, that one gains an understanding of truth and error in relation to spiritual research.

[ 30 ] Now we must go beyond mere imaginative insight. The next stage—please do not take offense at the word, which is meant to be merely a label—is called inspired insight. It occurs when a person has repeatedly sent their imaginations down into the deeper realms, has already gained insights through this first path, and as a result, their inner spiritual powers have grown stronger and stronger. Then a state sets in for the person in which they perceive formless things that bear no resemblance whatsoever to anything that can be perceived in the physical world through the intellect. The imaginative world still bears a great deal of resemblance to our own soul life, for example when the images one has sent down return, appearing in colors and pictures, and even in forms similar to those seen in the outer world. It then becomes difficult to distinguish illusion from reality. But the inspired world, toward which one is now evolving, no longer possesses anything that could be a characteristic of the sensory world. In contrast, at this stage of spiritual cognition, something arises that can be compared to a person listening to their own voice as they speak. One has this awareness directly. One has, to a greater degree than before, the awareness that one is present in everything; that one can recognize beings and facts of the spiritual world only by immersing oneself in them and experiencing them firsthand, just as one can speak one’s own words only by using one’s own organs. If this fact is to express the truth, one must not succumb to any delusion: it is you yourself who have allowed your consciousness to penetrate into everything, and whose own life emerges in the other things and realities. Because this is so, one of the prerequisites for true spiritual research is the ability to see nothing in what one oneself brings forth in the soul—and of which one knows full well that one is its own creator—other than that which springs from one’s own will.

[ 31 ] When a person speaks, he knows that he can form words and sentences, that he can express himself according to his own arbitrary emotions and passions, depending on what pleases or displeases him. But they also know that even in everyday life there is a possibility not only to express what is pleasant to them, but to speak of what arises out of necessity—to speak by obeying the necessity of truth. This is where one must begin. This cultivation of a sense for truth is the most essential element for inspired insight. One can achieve something in this area only by working repeatedly to tear out of one’s soul with all one’s might one’s own opinions and preferences—to tear out everything one would like to see happen in a certain way. These sensibilities can be cultivated. They alone lead to true insight in this area. An example will be given immediately.

[ 32 ] Among the most crucial questions for human life is the understanding of the immortality of the soul—the enduring nature of the human soul beyond birth and death. What could the human soul be more interested in than this question? Out of interest, human beings turn to this question. Now, an ancient saying from spiritual science states: Only those who have progressed to the point where it is equally bearable and equally appealing to them whether they are immortal or not can gain true insight into immortality. Before that, interest clouds true insight. Only when one has trained oneself and regulated one’s feelings to such an extent that one can bear the thought “you pass into nothingness with death” just as easily as the thought “you live on after death”—only then is it possible to arrive at an objective insight into the immortality of the soul through inspiration. It is a difficult inner task to regulate one’s feelings in this way.

[ 33 ] Thus, inspired insight is about bringing the soul into a certain state of mind, particularly with regard to what it can endure or what it does not readily endure. People often imagine that they can endure one thing just as well as another. They must therefore repeatedly undergo a renewed examination of the soul in order to gradually develop a state of serenity that then makes objective insight possible.

[ 34 ] When the spiritual researcher has reached the stage of imagination, he gains insight into beings of the spiritual world that are of such a nature that they are one and the same with our own soul. But here in the physical world, our soul is bound to a physical body. We must set this aside if we wish to perceive beings that do not extend to the level of physical embodiment. Spiritual beings and realities can already be reached through the process of imagination. Through the process of inspiration, we must attain an understanding of all that pertains to beings who are active in the external phenomena of nature. External natural science, when it is aware of its limits, recognizes laws and posits forces that are at work there. But spiritual knowledge perceives, behind all that is active in nature, beings who, as it were, direct the elements and bring about the phenomena of nature. That which is the actual creative force in the world—that which brings forth phenomena and external material things—is accessible only to that kind of knowledge which the gradually strengthening soul attains by truly surrendering its own being completely and learning to live entirely within the beings themselves.

[ 35 ] Then comes the stage of intuition, at which point the spiritual researcher attains a true shared experience of the actions of the creative powers that underlie material existence—powers that are of a spiritual nature but can manifest themselves in space and time, either in the great natural world or as individual, finite beings. In ordinary cognition, we deal only with our own soul. The soul, which is our spiritual essence, passes from one earthly life to the next. We live a life from birth or conception until death, then between death and a new birth in the purely spiritual-soul realm, then again a life between birth and death, and so on. Here we are dealing with the soul.

[ 36 ] If one develops imaginative perception sufficiently, if one takes the time until one truly develops the ability to distinguish between what comes from one’s own soul and what emerges from the depths, then one can come to distinguish between what belongs to this present life and what comes over from past earthly lives. Through progressive imaginative insight, one gains insight into past earthly lives. This is relatively easy to achieve. But this insight is limited to one’s own soul, which passes from one life to the next. It is much more difficult to know anything about another person’s past lives. For when one encounters another person, one is dealing with a physical body—an outer, material form in which that person lives—and the soul, which is the creative force within it, can, as we have seen, only be recognized through intuition. Therefore, one must ascend to this highest level of knowledge if it is to become possible to look into the repeated earthly lives of another person. This knowledge of the repeated earthly lives of other people is among the most difficult things that can be attained. The same fact may also emerge from something else.

[ 37 ] Instead of choosing the path through imagination—which, as described, leads through meditation and concentration—one can, to a certain limited extent, enter the spiritual world through another path of self-knowledge. If a person understands what is called the law of karma—and if they not only know but also experience within themselves that we ourselves have brought about what happens to us through past earthly lives— that is, when this self-knowledge is fused with the concept of karma and one trains oneself to reflect again and again on one’s own trials and abilities, then a kind of imagination may also arise—but a subjective, personal one that does not lead to objective truths and cannot apply to every human being. This path, however, leads us only to insights about ourselves. We shut ourselves off within our own souls. We may even be able to progress to a certain understanding of past lives, but a great deal of uncertainty remains. Yet we can never arrive at objective insights that apply to another person.

[ 38 ] If one wants to have a true understanding of the truths of the spiritual world, one must ask oneself: How does one learn to recognize the truth? One must learn to distinguish between reality and truth. One comes to know a new world, but coming to know it and judging it are not the same thing; they are fundamentally different. One can experience many things in the spiritual world; one may be able to recount many things from it; the things one recounts may be genuine images, and the image may indeed have been perceived correctly—yet that does not necessarily make it true. And as paradoxical as it sounds, it must be said that it is absolutely essential—and of the utmost importance—that anyone who wishes to enter this spiritual world bring with them the power of judgment they have developed in the ordinary world. Whoever has learned to develop common sense in the ordinary world—who does not delude themselves or allow themselves to be deluded in the ordinary world—will also carry that common sense into the spiritual world and judge the things they see there in the proper way. It is only through the power of judgment one brings with them that reality becomes truth. The power of judgment cannot be developed in the spiritual world; one must bring it with them. And it is fair to say: Those who think logically in the ordinary world will also find what is right and true in the spiritual world. Anyone who is foolish in the ordinary world and thinks illogically will become even more foolish and think even more illogically when they direct their foolish thinking toward the things of the spiritual world. The absolute necessity, when a person wishes to make a decision regarding truth or error in the spiritual world, is the development of a sound sense of truth and sound powers of observation in the physical world. Anyone who does not observe with attention and a sound power of observation how things unfold in the physical world—anyone who acts carelessly in the physical world—should, at best, not be believed at all when speaking of the spiritual world. For things from the spiritual world only become true when they resonate with our sense of truth. And then a certain moral sense is necessary—a certain moral disposition of the soul. Whoever enters the spiritual world with a moral state of mind will come into contact with the healthy forces of the spiritual world and come to know truths. But the one who enters with immoral forces—namely, with a sense of truth that has not been meticulously developed—will see everything in the spiritual world as distorted and caricatured, and will therefore communicate it as such. This applies not only to the spiritual researcher himself when investigating matters of the spiritual world, but especially when the spiritual researcher appears before an audience, a group of listeners, or a community of followers.

[ 39 ] What we aim to achieve today is to evoke a sense of the paths of truth leading into the spiritual world. After all, all exploration of the spiritual world is based on the development of certain powers that lie dormant in the soul; and powers that are linked to the human ego—which has sympathies and antipathies—can obscure the truth from the individual. In external life, life itself acts as a controlling and correcting force. If, for example, we think incorrectly about the direction of the path we must take to get home, external reality corrects us; we will not reach home if we have taken the wrong direction. For the spiritual researcher, the direction of truth is given only by the direction of the soul itself. Therefore, the truth—which is independent of this subjective human “I”—must first be developed within the soul; that is, the soul must transcend itself if it is to become a spiritual researcher.

[ 40 ] Another point is that the results of spiritual research must be communicated. Just as not everyone can personally investigate what external science studies in a laboratory or observatory, neither can everyone arrive at all the results of spiritual research on their own, even though in our time everyone can actually make some progress toward a certain limited goal in this area. But those who do not want to or cannot make that progress cannot object that they must leave it solely to spiritual researchers to know anything about the spiritual world. This can give rise to the prejudice—which we will discuss the day after tomorrow—that the spiritual researcher is a very special kind of person who proves himself to be a more valuable human being simply because he can look into the spiritual world. We will see that this does not at all increase a person’s worth; a person’s worth depends on something entirely different. And it would even be very useful if this very truth were widely disseminated—that the person who makes himself a bearer of spiritual-scientific knowledge is by no means to be regarded as anything special, such as an authority or the like. On the other hand, the true spiritual researcher is under an obligation to translate what can be researched into the concepts and ideas of the common sense of the culture of his time.

[ 41 ] And it is, in fact, a difficult task to find a way to express what one perceives in the spiritual world so that any open-minded person can understand the results. For one must not believe—and this, in turn, is an important truth—that the spiritual researcher derives any benefit for the security or strength of his own soul from what he beholds in the spiritual world. To put it simply, it is merely something to look at. It only becomes a benefit to the soul, nourishment for the soul, when what has been seen is expressed in ordinary concepts and ideas and made comprehensible. For example, the idea of the immortality of the soul is only of value when not merely the fact is perceived, but when what has been perceived is expressed in ordinary terms. And the fate of our soul depends solely on these concepts and ideas; it is on them that our strength depends. If the spiritual researcher succeeds in formulating the truths he has perceived in accordance with the laws of common sense and logic, then they have the same value for him as they do for other people. As long as he can only look into the spiritual world, it brings him no benefit for his inner life. Only when he can express things in such a way that others can grasp and understand them through their own logic—only then does he himself benefit from them. Thus, the spiritual researcher also acquires spiritual wealth for himself only when others—who cannot conduct such research themselves—understand him. Therefore, the essential task of integrating spiritual research into culture is not the training of the spiritual researcher, but rather the ability to present the findings of spiritual science to common sense and the culture of the times in such a way that anyone with an open mind can grasp them.

[ 42 ] We comprehend them in a very special way, which we will try to clarify through a comparison. Let’s suppose we have a picture in front of us. We can stand before it simply looking at it, without really understanding it. But we can also stand before it in such a way that we let it work its way into us, and after some time, once our soul has truly united with the painting, we understand what lies within it. Of course, we do not need to have the ability to paint the picture ourselves to do this. And likewise, it would be out of place if someone were to say: “You must look at the painting in such-and-such a way, then I can prove to you that the painting expresses this or that.” Anyone who tries to lead us to an understanding of the painting through proofs would—if we have any understanding of art at all—drive us to despair, but would not be able to make the painting comprehensible to us. Understanding the painting depends on something from the painting leaping into our soul, and this is independent of what the painter must be able to do in order to paint it. The same is true of what the spiritual researcher explores in the spiritual world and what he presents to other people in ideas and concepts.

[ 43 ] Ladies and gentlemen, you will find [on the book table] two books I have written. One of them, *How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds?*, describes the ways in which one can train the soul so that it may ascend into the spiritual worlds. In the other book, *An Outline of Esoteric Science*, you will find, in the first part, the findings of spiritual science. To the best of my ability, I have attempted there to formulate the findings in such a way that any contemporary—of course, not everyone does, but any contemporary could—who views these matters impartially and with common sense can understand and grasp them, for example, the process of the Earth’s formation and the development of humanity, and so on. So in these books we have two things before us: first, the path into the spiritual world; and second, a complete description of how the findings have been shaped into concepts and ideas that every person can grasp.

[ 44 ] Of course, I understand very well that people come along and say: “Yes, no one can grasp that, because it’s fantasy.”—Certainly, that’s possible for people who don’t examine it closely. But if someone does examine it closely, then what actually happened to me could happen to them as well. A very sensible and intelligent man once said that what is written in my books can be understood very well—so well, in fact, that one could arrive at it through logic alone. —Well, these things cannot, of course, be investigated using ordinary logic, but once they have been investigated, they can be understood through ordinary logic. But that man went on to say: “I find it so hard to believe that these things are drawn from the spiritual world, for they make such a credible impression on me that they seem to be attainable by purely logical means without any insight into the spiritual world.”—Well, I told him that I regard this as a merit of the book and am pleased if I have succeeded in presenting it in this way.

[ 45 ] This brings us back to what the painter must be able to do. The spiritual researcher must perceive the spiritual world; when he then processes what he has perceived, brings it down, and clothes it in concepts, it stands before us like the painter’s picture. Then comes the moment when the person who allows these findings from the spiritual world to take effect upon them immediately grasps and understands the matter without having to investigate the spiritual world themselves; and then one can clearly distinguish whether one is surrendering to a belief or to the persuasive power of what has been put into words.

[ 46 ] We will be able to characterize the paths of truth even more fully when, the day after tomorrow, we turn our attention to the part that is almost more important for this discussion: the sources of error in spiritual research. But let us now, at the end of this lecture, turn our attention to what is always a consideration in spiritual research.

[ 47 ] It has been said that when the spiritual researcher finally arrives at the formulated truth about the supersensible worlds, anyone who approaches it with an open mind can allow its persuasive power to take effect upon them. But when this happens, the sum of spiritual truths becomes nourishment for the soul; through it, we gain something without which our soul cannot live in the long run. One can deprive the soul of spiritual nourishment, but not of its hunger for it. And even if a person lives thoughtlessly and wants nothing to do with spiritual nourishment, the hunger for it remains, although the person is not clear about where the source lies—namely, in the fact that he or she does not want to approach the spiritual world. If this hunger is not satisfied, it destroys the entire life of the soul; this is evident in all manner of pathological phenomena of our time.

[ 48 ] Through the natural sciences, we come to recognize that we have certain substances in our bodies that are the same as those found out there in outer space. Through spiritual science, we feel at rest within the whole of the world. We realize that what lives in our soul—and is intimately connected with our well-being and suffering—is one with the spiritual and soul-life of the entire world, which is spread throughout all space and all time. And in our spiritual nature, we recognize what is at work out there in the whole world. Then we feel what such an insight can mean for our soul, what it can give our soul in terms of strength, security, and health.

[ 49 ] We can summarize this in two sayings, two aphorisms that capture the essence of life. Goethe once sought to show that the human eye must be designed to perceive light—an idea that has also been expressed by philosophers—and that the soul must possess an inner spiritual quality. He sought to demonstrate this with the beautiful saying:

If the eye were not like the sun,
How could we see the light?
If God’s own power did not live within us,
How could the divine delight us?

[ 50 ] But Goethe also added that human beings were once eyeless creatures and that the sun had to exist for humans to have eyes—that is, that light created the eye. It is true that everything would be dark without the eye; light must have been present to form the eye. And just as the eye is formed by light, so is the human spirit formed by the spirit that permeates the entire world. And we may say: It is precisely in such things that one recognizes the one-sidedness of profound truths. It is true that light and spirit must be inherent within us if we are to perceive light and spirit. It is true that the entire world must be filled with light if an organ of light is to be formed within a being through this light, and it is true that the entire world must owe its origin to the spirit if the spirit is to emerge within human beings.

[ 51 ] It is also true, however, that if we add to this profound but one-sided truth the other truth that emerges from our reflection and summarizes it entirely in the spirit of Goethe:

If the world were not blessed with the sun,
How could eyes blossom in living beings?
If existence were not a revelation of God,
How could people attain fulfillment in God!

Question and Answer

Question: Have the humanities produced any findings regarding the fourth dimension and higher dimensions?

[ 52 ] Rudolf Steiner: This is not easy to explain. People start from what they know of the physical-sensory world, where space has three dimensions. Mathematicians form—at least theoretically—concepts of a fourth dimension and higher dimensions by analytically extending the concepts of three-dimensional space through variable quantities. This makes it possible, at least in mathematical thinking, to speak of higher manifolds. For someone familiar with these matters—that is, someone who is deeply engaged with them and at the same time well-versed in mathematics—much becomes clear. Reference should be made to the work of Oskar Simony in Vienna.

[ 53 ] At first, this is merely an idea. The actual perception comes when one enters the spiritual world. There, there is a real necessity to orient oneself immediately in more than three dimensions. For everything that is imagined pictorially—that is, still bearing the characteristics of three dimensions—is nothing other than a reflection of one’s own inner soul processes. In the higher worlds, spatial relationships are entirely different—if one can even still call them spatial relationships—and the same is true with regard to time. This should be taken into account above all by those who always say—and one does indeed encounter many such “excellent” objections—that what is claimed about the spiritual world is nothing but hallucinations. The fact that spiritual research deals with phenomena that are something entirely different from hallucinations is not taken into account.

[ 54 ] This question provides an opportunity to expand on what was said in the lecture, namely to point out the transformation that things undergo in terms of time and space when they enter the spiritual world. After all, one cannot say everything in a single lecture, and today’s lecture has already gone on for quite a long time. When the images [of the imagination] that have been, as it were, sent down into the underworld return, what comes back only makes sense if one approaches it in a multidimensional way. But this then seems as natural and self-evident as the three-dimensional world of the senses. That is why ordinary geometry is not suitable for the things of the spiritual world.

[ 55 ] For mathematicians, it must be said that speculations about the fourth dimension then begin to have real significance. Usually, however, [higher dimensions] are conceived merely as a generalization [of three-dimensional space], not based on reality, to which these [spaces] do not fully correspond. One would actually need an even more advanced form of mathematics if one wanted, for example, to perform calculations involving the subjects with which the researcher of the spirit deals.

[ 56 ] But the question posed here must be answered in the affirmative. Correlations to a supersensory world—including concepts of infinity that prevail in mathematics—become reality, particularly those things on the frontier of mathematics. For example, I once had the experience of suddenly gaining insight—as if in a flash of inspiration—into an extraordinarily important property of astral space when, many years ago now, I was studying modern geometry, as it was called at the time, and analytical mechanics at the university.

[ 57 ] That on an infinite straight line, the infinite far point on the left is identical to the infinite far point on the right; that a straight line is in reality a circle; and that, if one simply does not run out of steam and walks along the straight line long enough, one will come back out on the other side—one can see this, but [one should] not draw conclusions from it. Conclusions lead nowhere in spiritual research. One must allow things to take effect upon oneself; this leads to the knowledge of the supersensible world. In general, mathematics should not be overestimated when it comes to the supersensible world. Mathematics is useful only in a formal sense; it is not a means of reaching reality. But mathematics can be understood solely through the powers within the soul itself, and this applies to every other human being as well. This is what mathematics has in common with spiritual science.

Question: How do the physical body, the astral body, and the “I” relate to one another?

[ 58 ] Rudolf Steiner: Well, these things only become completely clear to one after years of studying spiritual science. Things are not so simple, and what one states simply then sounds, well, let’s say, like an oracle. The subjects of spiritual science cannot be taken dogmatically if one ever wants to understand them. Sleep, for example, has been described by me as follows: The physical body and the etheric body lie in bed, and the astral body and the “I” step out. – How should we interpret something like this? First of all, as a metaphor. As a metaphor, it is correct. Although it may sometimes sound as if this metaphor is based on a fact, that is only a very one-sided view. It is possible to describe the matter in exactly the opposite way, by saying: In the waking state, the I and the astral body are, in a certain sense, outside the physical body.