The Rudolf Steiner Archive

2. Christ and the Twentieth Century

[ 1 ] Ladies and gentlemen! The question of Christ is arousing interest today in the widest circles. In our so-called enlightened age, this question is poised to become one of the most significant. When one considers the character of our entire culture, this interest is understandable. The figure of Christ was one that provided the deepest inspiration for Western culture over many centuries. In the present, however, this figure seems, in certain respects, to be fading away, as if slipping from our grasp. In the light of historical research, the figure of Christ seems, as it were, to crumble. In contrast, there is [a tendency to seek] nothing more than a deeper understanding of the essence of Jesus of Nazareth. But this figure is even doubted in terms of his historical existence. “Did Jesus live?”—this is a question often asked today. Such a question cuts deeply into everyone’s hearts. As with all historical phenomena, one may ask whether Christ Jesus was a historical figure. But the Gospels are not documents like others—[like ordinary historical documents]. From the standpoint of contemporary historical research, the faith in the figure of Christ among those who seek historical support must, with some justification, simply be shaken. This is one reason why [in the past] the impulse had such a profound impact on people and why [this research today] must be met with such great interest: precisely because of [people’s] fear of losing a well-founded belief in the figure of Christ.

[ 2 ] We will now say a few words—albeit only in outline form—about this problem just described from the perspective of the humanities. [But what spiritual science has to say is this: it gives rise to a well-founded hope—that Christ, who was irrevocably taken from humanity in an external sense, can be restored to them.] The figure of Christ, as revealed by spiritual science, is something “contrary” to common creeds and judgments; indeed, it is downright repugnant to them. What is to be said this evening will not only meet with opposition, but will also be dismissed as daydreaming, as fantasy. It is not possible to cover everything related to this question within the scope of a single lecture, but by sharing what spiritual science has discovered, perhaps one or two additional insights will emerge afterward. In fact, the question only becomes clear when we look back at the various conceptions people have held about Christ over the centuries.

[ 3 ] It must be admitted: The conception of Christ in the first centuries has something alien about it for [us] today; [this was already the case back then, and gaining an understanding of it] becomes increasingly impossible later [over time]. Thus, the current point of view has developed: Spiritual science arrives at conclusions regarding Christ that are similar to those [once] reached by the Gnostic science of the first centuries. The Gnostics are often called sects, [yet] they rose to the highest heights of human thought and feeling—something in which people today have little interest. The adherents of Gnosticism were far from embracing monistic views—a refined term for “materialistic.” The Gnostic does not find the primordial human in the animal kingdom, but [for him] the primordial human is a still spiritual being; this being did not outwardly assume a physical body in the animal kingdom, but rather, as a spiritual human being, gradually brought itself into harmony with the laws of the physical body. This incarnation has brought humanity to the state in which it now finds itself.

[ 4 ] [And so the Gnostics asked:] How do we find the [original] human being? Within ourselves? On the one hand, we find what we have become in terms of our spiritual life; on the other, a striving, a belief in a higher human nature. Through this, a person can unleash certain powers within themselves, enabling them to elevate themselves. They discover their higher nature. Thus, a sum of powers is hidden within the higher human nature. This is the Gnostics’ view: Human beings are destined for a life in higher spheres; their life on Earth is lower, falling short of what they could be in spirit. Human beings’ [physical] life is not in harmony with their higher nature; yet it is not lost; it is merely necessary for physical progress [on Earth]. The higher aspect has been preserved in the spiritual world. Eventually, this superhuman aspect was able to descend and work within human nature; at a certain point in time, a primordial human being, so to speak, was able to descend and work within human nature—a being that had been preserved in the spiritual world until then. Gnosticism conceived of this being as the Christ. He embodies within himself the impulse toward the highest that a human being can attain. This moment [of descent] coincides—symbolically speaking—with the baptism of John.

[ 5 ] [From the perspective of Gnosticism], people are more or less advanced. Gnosticism revered Jesus of Nazareth as the highest, the most outstanding human being in the evolution of the Earth. We can describe what happened to him at the age of thirty without shocking people: A person grows up, showing this or that pattern of development, until a certain point in life when a break occurs—something entirely new enters the life of the soul—something that seemed completely unprepared for. Some portray this as impossible, but there are turning points in human life—radical breaks. Imagine such a transformation—intensified to the highest degree. Even if this transformation occurs [only] to the smallest extent, a person feels like a new being, one they were not before. [The Gnostics assume such a transformation when they speak of what occurred to Jesus of Nazareth in his thirtieth year.]

[ 6 ] The primordial human being took up residence in the soul of Jesus of Nazareth. The latter was like an outer vessel; he is regarded, in the Gnostic sense, as the bearer of Christ. Thus, one cannot say that Christ is identical with Jesus of Nazareth. But this was not a new phase of development in the life of Jesus of Nazareth: what had always existed in the heavenly realms, what had been preserved from the very beginning, descended to Earth and lived for three years in the body of Jesus. This is the infinite spiritual depth of the idea: Human evolution has ascended to the Most High with God and has, as it were, been saturated by this power of the Most High. A small circle of Gnostics was able to grasp [the great significance of the event]—that what had been preserved was returned to humanity.

[ 7 ] We cannot go through all the individual stages of the visions of Christ, but we can mention a few, for example, those of the profound thinkers of the Middle Ages. They were characterized by the most intense faith, but it was not possible for them to rise to Gnostic concepts. It was impossible in the Middle Ages to reflect on Christian Gnosticism. Such thinking would have been regarded as mere fantasy. In the Middle Ages, the perspective was limited to what lay below the sphere of the Gnostics. They drew upon Aristotle, [whose] world of ideas was formed four hundred years before Christ; Aristotle was the “trendsetter” at that time. Spiritual flight was attributed to the [realm of] faith. Aristotle said: Everything that underlies the realms of nature is spiritual; yet he did not accept the reincarnation of the human soul. He was interested in what could be known through the laws of nature; he was interested only in a single, unified God. [According to his view], at every birth the human soul separates from the unified divine substance. But after death, the soul does not return to the divine; rather, it continues to exist in the spiritual world as an individual human being. For Aristotle, the entire supersensory world is purely a matter of knowledge. After death, a person looks back on his earthly life and then finds his reward or his torment—eternal punishment and reward. This is connected to Aristotle’s philosophy—Franz Brentano, [a great scholar of Aristotle, has commented on this at length in his works]. Although medieval scholars alluded to knowledge of the spiritual world, for them [epistemological access to the spiritual] was ruled out—the realm of gnosis, to which one can gain [access] [through] knowledge.

[ 8 ] [And so one might ask:] What is missing from the faith of medieval people? Well, what is missing is the awareness, [the conscious realization], that human beings have [also intellectually] committed a fall into sin. Spiritual science seeks to lift them out of this [unconsciousness]; this then becomes a [new] Christ-consciousness, distinct from all that is mythological and legendary. The permeation [of Jesus of Nazareth] by the ruling Spirit was merely faith, but not knowledge. Thus, humanity has come to the point where it can no longer imagine what it means for Christ to take possession of Jesus; it is nonsense to the materialistic thinking of the modern age that [the Christ-being as] something real descended from spiritual heights to humanity. All that remains is Jesus of Nazareth as an exceptional human being.

[ 9 ] Well, contradictions arose quite easily when people sought clarification in the four documents [the Gospels] and found discrepancies. It is really child’s play to prove that they [in many respects] do not agree. [And one wonders:] Didn’t people notice this before? It’s easy to attribute all sorts of folly to our ancestors, [acting as if] they had never read the Gospels. Thus, Jesus of Nazareth has become increasingly diluted; [for many in modern times] he is now nothing more than a particularly good person. This is flattering to modern people; [to them] Jesus of Nazareth is a person like any other, only somewhat greater: [like] Plato or Socrates. Thus, Jesus became the “simple man from Nazareth.” The simpler and more commonplace [his image became], the more people liked it and the more they believed it corresponded to historical truth. This is what is called “unbiased research.” The only thing that becomes objective here is what one [apparently] recognizes as objective. The greatest theologians believed one must approach the matter without prejudice, assuming nothing to be true—but [what do they do?] They go ahead and simply strike out [what they cannot make sense of in the Gospels]. Hence [the question arises]: “Did Jesus live?” No other conclusion was possible [given such a way of thinking]. Externally, historically, the existence of Jesus cannot be proven. [Professor] Drews and his followers are absolutely right in the way they present it. [For he is consistent in his thinking]. Anything else would be like floundering around trying to prove something that cannot be proven.

[ 10 ] Spiritual science is rooted in culture; [it arrives at insights into the spiritual course of human development through certain methods], as has been discussed in the book *Christianity as a Mystical Fact*. This title was not chosen arbitrarily: it does not refer to Christian mysticism, but rather to the fact that the Christ impulse must be understood as the driving force behind what is found in outer, physical reality. The most important impulse in Earth’s evolution is the Christ impulse; it is the focal point of this entire historical development. Spiritual science once again takes up where Gnosticism left off, but it does so of its own accord, entirely independently of it. The human soul functioned quite differently in pre-Christian times than it does today. It is a bad habit to refuse to acknowledge that the human soul was different. [...] In the past, dreamlike clairvoyance was a third state between sleeping and waking. People knew then that spiritual beings existed, just as they know today that plants and animals exist. The ancient legends and myths are images of what people saw. The myths are transformed versions of ancient clairvoyant experiences. [But this clairvoyance had to be lost, for it was a prelude to the development of the “I” in human evolution—to the development of the fully formed human “I” in the physical world, of the human being’s self-constructed existence.]

[ 11 ] This is the course of human development: From vague clairvoyance, humanity is to progress to clear, conscious clairvoyance, which will be firmly established in the future. In ancient times, there was no knowledge of the reasons for existence that was acquired in any way other than through clairvoyance. [Although] Deussen [claims the opposite, one must say]: It was not until the Greek era that [rational] knowledge of the external world emerged—in fact, not until Thales; Thales was the first. What stems from atavistic clairvoyance is not [philosophy]. In antiquity, the places where human beings transcended the ordinary state were the mystery schools—[from today’s perspective, a hybrid between a university and a church. In these mystery schools, people could attain initiation]. The initiates recognized that the spirit reveals itself only in the “I,” not in the powers of the soul; the “I” is the center of the soul’s being. But at first, the Spirit revealed itself only as God living within the entire people, as was the case with the ancient Hebrews. The deepest essence of the human being is immediately divine; body and soul are only indirectly so. Through certain precepts and exercises, the life of the soul can become independent of the body. The divine lives within the ordinary human being, just as he is in life; it reveals itself from the core of his being, the “I.” There were various initiation rites, essentially four. The Mysteries became a historical fact in the Mystery of Golgotha—that was the Christ Impulse! Christ is the universal Spirit; His life unfolded before all humanity on the physical plane, not lived out on a small scale—how insignificant that would be—before individuals, before the Apostles and others, but representatively before all humanity. Thus, the ancient mysteries were superseded by the One. In the “I,” in the innermost being of the soul, lies the highest power of humanity. In this way, we can rise again from the Fall.

[ 12 ] The point in time when the “I” became dependent on itself preceded the Christ impulse by only six hundred years. From that point on, human beings have been fully immersed in the world, which is perceived solely through the external senses. In natural development, we are constantly dealing with leaps, and this also applies to human development. Thus, every era is a transitional period, and our own era is especially so.

[ 13 ] Some old forms are fading away, both moral and intellectual. Human beings are being placed at the pinnacle of their own personalities. Until now, it has been a time of preparation—[one could take it to heart or not]—but now heightened forces must come into play within human nature. Souls are experiencing an elevation of their powers. The last time this happened was in the Greek [era], six hundred years before Christ; there, [this impulse] entered into human development [as the beginning of independent thought]. Today we stand at a point in time similar to that six hundred years before Christ. But back then, the human soul was guided outward into the physical world; now its sole anchor is the “I”; and the Christ-presence must take its place within this “I” of the human being. It is a [kind of] repetition, but now directed inward, internalized.

[ 14 ] In this “I” lies the center of the world. Through our internalization, the highest impulses that [can] live within human beings will emerge—[it is] a spiritual return of the Christ within; [there will be] the development of soul forces capable of grasping the Christ in a new form; [experiencable] through spiritual intuition, not in the physical world. [This experience is not identical with the experience of the inner, mystical Christ—that is, with something that was already there.] Spiritual science reveals to us both the inner, mystical Christ and the historical Christ. Anyone who wishes to believe only in the inner, mystical Christ, and not in the historical Christ, is mistaken. We also need the historical Christ, for there would be no inner, mystical Christ without the historical Christ. The sense of Christ within us depends on the spiritual sun just as the eye depends on light: it depends on the historical Christ. Without him, there is no possibility of the inner Christ—it is the historical Christ who created the organ for the experience of Christ in the hearts of human beings.