The Rudolf Steiner Archive

2. Anthroposophy does not interfere with anyone’s religious beliefs

[ 1 ] If religious sentiment and experience were to correctly understand their role in relation to the demands of the present age, and were then, from a perspective gained in this way, to confront with full understanding what anthroposophy—as understood here—strives for, then religious sentiment and confession would be able to see in anthroposophy a most welcome ally, especially today. However, people today do not always make it their task to truly get to know the nature of the things about which they believe they can offer a suitable, competent judgment. This is particularly true—one might even say to a very great extent—with regard to what is meant here by anthroposophy. People judge what they encounter by affixing some label taken from outside, often creating a true caricature of what it is really about; and then they judge not this reality, but the image they have created themselves—often the caricature they have created themselves.

[ 2 ] If one were to delve into anthroposophy and truly consider its role in addressing the mysteries and problems of our time, one would, above all, be drawn to something that shines forth from the very spirit and essence of anthroposophical research. That is: Anthroposophy differs, one might say, from all other opinions and views concerning the world, humanity, and so on, in that it is vividly imbued—as its insights necessarily require—with what, in the broadest sense, lies at the heart of the idea of evolution.

[ 3 ] Human opinions—especially when they aspire to be worldviews—are satisfied only when they can say, in a certain sense and at least within certain limits: I have thoughts that are valid; they are absolutely valid in and of themselves; I have discovered them, or science or religion or something else has discovered them; but they are valid—they are absolutely valid in and of themselves. — This is not the case with anthroposophy. Anthroposophy knows that ideas must be born in every age out of what, in a deeper sense, can be called the spirit of the age. And the spirit of humanity is in constant development. Thus, what emerges as a view of the world in one age must take a different form than what emerges in a similar way in another age. As anthroposophy presents itself to the world today, it knows that centuries from now, what it says today will have to be expressed in a completely different form to meet entirely different human needs and interests; that it cannot strive for “absolute truths,” but rather that it is in a state of living evolution.

[ 4 ] A certain mindset arises from such premises. And this mindset, in turn, determines the assessment that anthroposophy must make of other spiritual endeavors and spiritual currents; it determines the relationship it must establish with other spiritual currents, other opinions, and other worldviews. For our time, it should be borne in mind above all that anthroposophy did not arise at all as many people believe, and that it cannot be placed within the fabric of contemporary opinions and views in the way that is still very commonly believed today. People tend to think—based on a superficial, external understanding of anthroposophy, gained perhaps by hearing a single lecture on the subject or reading a few pages of some book about it, a pamphlet, or perhaps not even that, but simply by being told by someone else what anthroposophy is all about, even though that person’s knowledge is highly questionable— one thinks that anthroposophy presents itself as a system of belief, as a kind of new religious view standing in opposition to other religious denominations. Over time, people have simply come to feel that whatever thoughts or ideas about the world are put forward are simply one belief system among many. — And so they think: This anthroposophy is just another sect, like the many sects that pop up in the world, presenting itself as one such sect alongside the others.

[ 5 ] Now, in contrast to this, it must be emphasized: First, what is particularly characteristic of the anthroposophy referred to here is that it did not enter the world in some way alongside or in opposition to any creed. Why it entered the world, the reasons do not lie in this or that creed, on which it must take a stand, but rather the reasons why it entered the world precisely in the present day lie in the development of the natural sciences over the last few centuries and in more recent times—in that very development of the natural sciences that has shaped the opinions and views of people today. Anthroposophy aims to be a supplement, an extension, and a perfection of what has entered the world through the natural sciences. This starting point must certainly be taken into account. For when one becomes acquainted with the achievements of natural science—and here I wish to focus primarily not on the achievements of specialized scholarship, but on that which passes from natural science into the public consciousness, that which becomes, through natural science itself, an opinion about the worldview, that which becomes a feeling about the worldview— when one looks at all that natural science has to offer humanity, one must say: This natural science has developed—and will continue to develop even more brilliantly over time—into an interpreter of that which is outwardly sensible existence, and of what can be grasped by the intellect from this sensible existence. Precisely—as I already mentioned yesterday—when one is able to engage with, to engage deeply with, what modern natural science has accomplished, then one not only gains the highest respect for it and harbors the greatest expectations for the future, but one also knows that this natural science achieves its perfection precisely by formulating laws and develops methods that are, in the most eminent sense, suited to grasping external, natural, sensory existence—but which, if left as they are, as they currently prevail in scientific research itself, are unsuited to grasping the spiritual. If one wishes to grasp the spiritual with precisely the same rigor and the same scientific validity as one grasps the natural in the sense of modern natural science, then one must, starting from natural science—from the way of thinking and the mindset of natural science—work one’s way into the spiritual world in the manner described yesterday.

[ 6 ] However, this presents major difficulties for some people today. One could say: It is precisely through the most brilliant advances in the natural sciences—which have allowed us to peer even into the frontier regions of the spiritual—that we have developed a natural worldview in which there is actually no place for the spirit. This must be so. Precisely because the methods of the natural sciences are suited to natural existence, they must be such that, in a certain sense, they exclude the spirit from their own field of inquiry. If we consider human beings themselves, we must say: anatomy, physiology, and biology—as they examine human beings in relation to their physical existence—can only study and penetrate this subject from all angles if they demonstrate that, through their own methods and their own approach to research, the spirit is, in a sense, excluded.

[ 7 ] But if one embraces the way in which the natural sciences proceed—if one immerses oneself in this approach—then one can continue the natural sciences in the manner I described yesterday. And through certain methods that the human soul applies to itself, one enters the realm of the spiritual world directly from natural existence. The spiritual world becomes a reality before the spiritual eye and the spiritual ear—to use these expressions of Goethe’s in a modified way—just as the sensory reality of the mineral, plant, air, and stellar worlds is a reality for the outer senses. One works one’s way into the spiritual realm.

[ 8 ] This poses a difficulty for a great many people. You will hear, when people speak in this way about the relationship between natural science and anthroposophically oriented spiritual science, that people say: Yes, he may well be quite right in what he says about natural science; one cannot capture the spirit using the methods of natural science; one cannot determine anything about the spirit; there are simply limits, and there are simply realms beyond natural science about which we cannot know anything.” — But it will have become clear from yesterday’s lecture, from its entire meaning and spirit, that this is not the view of anthroposophy. The opposite is the experience of anthroposophy: that one can truly penetrate the spirit, that it is not merely a matter of saying there are unknown realms to which one must refer, but that one can truly penetrate these unknown realms through certain spiritual methods.

[ 9 ] It is, after all, difficult for some people to tell themselves: There is still a field about which one might learn something if one were open to certain ideas and research. — It is much more comfortable for these people to tell themselves: This is a field that no one knows anything about — because they themselves do not yet know anything about it. However, the mere fact that one does not know anything about something oneself is no proof that one cannot know anything about it, even though this conclusion is drawn with surprising frequency. This is precisely what is at stake when anthroposophy asserts that one can enter, as a human being, through the application of those methods alluded to yesterday and which you can find in my writings, notably in my work How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds? and in my Occult Science, that one can enter a spiritual world in which, in truth, the human being is present with his or her soul, in which, in truth, the human being experiences what can be called immortality and freedom—the very impulses of his or her supersensible existence.

[ 10 ] And because, over the past few centuries and right up to the present day, the natural sciences have necessarily been of such a nature that they focus on the transitory—on that which is brought to an end by death—it is precisely for this reason that something had to emerge in opposition to them: something that, like the natural sciences, can lay claim to scientific rigor and that enters the realm of the spirit.

[ 11 ] In earlier times, when the religious movements and creeds that directed people toward the spiritual world were not yet countered by a natural science that, precisely through its methods, fosters a certain inclination toward the sensory world alone, it was not necessary for a specific spiritual science to emerge; for there was also no specific natural science that claimed to possess the only correct method and, based on this belief, arrived at the view that is today called “monistic,” since the term “materialistic” is no longer considered socially acceptable. There was not yet such a natural science that could lead one to believe that the only reality was external sensory reality—that is, what can be grasped by the intellect from this sensory reality as science. It was only when such a science—and with it such a belief—could emerge that a science of the spirit had to arise, one that asserts the opposite, one that places the science of the spirit alongside the science of nature. This is simply a matter of historical development.

[ 12 ] Therefore, one can only truly understand the emergence of anthroposophy if one understands its origins in the natural sciences and its necessity alongside them. If natural science were to generate in people a kind of dogmatic faith solely from within itself, it would gradually—through the seductive nature of its strictly scientific methods—completely dissuade people from the view that one can penetrate the spiritual world scientifically, through knowledge; it would lead people to believe, to the greatest extent possible: “Well, one can know the sensory world; everything else that lies beyond the sensory world is subject to faith, which can never lead to certainty in the supersensible realm, but only to a subjective emotional state.”

[ 13 ] This is the point that is initially most difficult for contemporaries to understand, because it takes a certain effort to subject the soul to those experiences through which it transcends ordinary existence, through which it acquires spiritual organs in addition to its sensory organs in order to penetrate the true spiritual world. And it will be a long time before the prevailing prejudices in this regard fade away, before a sufficiently large number of people come to realize that one can now penetrate the spiritual world in a scientific manner, just as one does nature.

[ 14 ] Now, in order for this anthroposophically oriented spiritual science to gradually take root in our cultural life, it is necessary—and this should really be taken for granted—that people who have the will and the need to pursue such spiritual science come together. It is precisely out of this need to come together to develop such spiritual science that everything has arisen—and continues to take shape—in and around the Dornach building. The coming together of individual people, however, immediately gives rise to the mistaken notion: “Well, this must be a sect; here, people are banding together to cultivate some new religious belief among themselves.” But coming together in this field has a different purpose than coming together in sects. Coming together in the field of anthroposophy means that anthroposophy cannot be attained through a single lecture or by reading a single pamphlet; rather, it is something that, for those who truly wish to know it to a certain extent, must be worked out step by step—something that people must therefore work out for themselves. This must also take place in schools and universities; and if one wishes to describe the coming together of a student body at universities as a “sect,” then one can also describe the coming together of those who practice anthroposophy as a “sect”—and in no other way. If only a certain number of people—those who have already absorbed other knowledge—can attend certain lectures or events, this seems entirely natural; for the same is true of the acquisition of any other kind of knowledge. Anthroposophy seeks to fit into the most modern institutions, not into sectarian structures. It intends to engage precisely with modern institutions. And there is nothing particularly mysterious underlying the fact that people come together and hold events exclusively for themselves; rather, it is solely because they have sought to prepare themselves for these events, just as one seeks to prepare for university lectures before attending them, because otherwise attendance would be pointless. Any other opinion one might form about such a gathering is misguided in this regard, for it misses the point.

[ 15 ] Now, however, it must be said: Such an association, particularly in this field, must necessarily take on a somewhat different character than, for example, an association of students at a university. The knowledge imparted at a university relates, for the most part, to external life—with the exception of very few, one might say, enclaves; particularly under the current trend in the natural sciences, given the direction it has taken, it relates to what the intellect and reason grasp on the basis of sensory observation. But this is directed more toward mere thinking; it is directed more, one might say, toward one aspect of the human being: it is directed toward mere intellectual understanding. Not that anthroposophy does not address intellectual understanding! — People who believe themselves to be competent sometimes judge anthroposophy precisely on the basis of their prejudices; there are things that do not sit right with them; they find this anthroposophy amateurish. If these people were to examine it more closely, they would indeed find that the thinking required for external science—the logic required for external science—must not only be present in anthroposophy, but that a much finer, higher logic is necessary for true understanding later on, in the more advanced parts of anthroposophy. But what must be said about anthroposophy—what must be revealed through anthroposophy’s research into the spiritual world—does not merely engage the human mind, nor merely intellectual understanding; rather, it engages the whole human being, it engages the human being in the fullness of their soul: all feeling, all thinking, all willing, and all inner impulses are encompassed by it. As a result, however—and I would say this—when a person approaches anthroposophy, they enter into a more intimate relationship with the knowledge that is imparted to them than, for example, through mere university study.

[ 16 ] Now, perhaps, in order to make myself fully understood on this point, I may add that anthroposophy is indeed significant for the present day—in the context of human development—as a complement to the natural sciences; that it arises precisely in the spirit of the times; but that what anthroposophy strives for—the insights that human beings seek to attain—has, in the way it served earlier ages—in the way it corresponded to the needs and interests of those times—has actually always been there. But people have held different views regarding the process, regarding the development of the corresponding insights. When looking back to earlier times at the analogous phenomena that correspond to anthroposophy today, one must speak of mysteries; one must even speak of secret societies in which, in the course of human development, what must now be pursued in anthroposophy—albeit in a completely different form appropriate to the present—was once carried out. Those who, in earlier times, engaged in such research and cultivated such practices through which the higher insights of the spiritual world were brought to humanity held the view regarding this work that it must be confined precisely to a circle of people who are very well prepared for such work—people in whom it has been ascertained that they truly possess the right disposition and also the necessary preparation of the mind, and character necessary to receive something that grips the whole human being in the depths of their soul. And so the knowledge cultivated in such mysteries and secret societies was kept strictly confidential. Even today one can see that, aside from secondary considerations—which certainly also applied, but which I need not elaborate on—there were good reasons to protect this higher knowledge from public scrutiny, one might say, from desecration by the general public. There were good reasons for this. And with a view to the development of spiritual science today, I would like to hint at some of these reasons.

[ 17 ] For when one enters the spiritual world from the sensory world in the manner described yesterday, one is faced, above all, with the task of crossing a certain boundary. One can quite aptly use an expression that many who understood such matters have employed: one must cross the threshold, as it has always been said, into the spiritual world. This expression has meaning. It is not merely a figurative expression. It has meaning insofar as the science of the spiritual—the knowledge of the spiritual—when it truly approaches human beings in earnest and human beings seriously engage with it, brings into them concepts, ideas, images, and perspectives that are truly quite different from the images and perspectives one has of the external sensory world. One might even say: Anyone who is so fixated on initially accepting, out of habit, only what is true with regard to the external sensory world will find that when truths from the spiritual world are communicated, they sound paradoxical at first; they sound so different from the truths about the sensory world that they might seem paradoxical—or, as some might say using a common expression, fantastical, confused, or perhaps even crazy. This stems precisely from the fact that one is entirely mistaken if one believes that the spiritual world, which underlies our sensory world, is merely a kind of continuation of that sensory world; that it is essentially the same, only somewhat more nebulous, somewhat more ethereal, somewhat finer, and somewhat more subtle than the sensory world.

[ 18 ] No, one must come to terms with the fact that one must experience as truth things that are new, unheard of in the sensory world, and paradoxical to the sensory world, if one wishes to engage with the true spiritual world. Therefore, entering into the true spiritual world is not only startling, but it often evokes feelings in a person—especially when standing at the threshold between the sensory and spiritual worlds—that resemble the fear and hesitation always present when a person enters uncharted territory. For those who have gained their experience solely in the physical world, the spiritual world is uncharted territory. And so it happens that, on the threshold of the spiritual world, two things can merge in human perception: on the one hand, there is what one must still recognize as truth with regard to the physical world—the sequence of facts and the lawful course of events; but then, as it were, something strikes one from the other side of the world—from the spiritual side—that is subject to different laws, that unfolds in an entirely different way, and that makes a paradoxical impression. At first, these two perspectives may clash.

[ 19 ] But this places thinking—and the soul’s perception—in a situation that places high demands on common sense and on a sound ability to assess the entire situation. One must be well-prepared in terms of common sense and sound judgment if one wishes to distinguish, in this borderland, between illusion and fantasy on the one hand, and spiritual reality on the other. Anyone who truly studies the books I mentioned yesterday and today will see that the method described there for penetrating the spiritual world is designed in such a way that it does not in any way impair or dull the health of one’s senses, intellect, or reason, but rather enhances and fosters them. Everything that is nebulous mysticism, everything associated with a dreamlike, hypnotized penetration into the spiritual world, is the very opposite of what sound spiritual research strives for.

[ 20 ] However, this does not prevent malicious people—and they are simply malicious people—from coming forward time and again to declare: that the spiritual scientific method hypnotizes people and suggests all sorts of things to them—while nothing can contribute more decisively to protecting people from all hypnotic influences, from all suggestion, and from all unwarranted influence of one person over another than what the true spiritual scientific methods—which set people free and enable them to stand on their own—can offer them. Time and again, the spiritual scientific method operates in such a way that it is based on the following fundamental principle:

[ 21 ] In my book The Riddle of Man, I pointed out that one can say: Just as a person awakens from sleep—in which they have only a very dull consciousness—to ordinary waking consciousness, so too can they awaken from this ordinary consciousness, in which they find themselves in everyday life, to spiritual vision. It is like awakening into a spiritual world, which one attains through the method of spiritual science. But just as ordinary daily life can never be healthy unless one takes precautions to ensure that one’s sleep is healthy, so entering the spiritual world cannot be healthy unless one first develops a healthy everyday life grounded in genuine reality and practical wisdom, unless one has first disciplined oneself to such an extent that, in the external sphere of life, one is a person who is a match for reality. Awakening to perception can only arise from a healthy daily life, just as awakening to a healthy daily life can only arise from healthy sleep, not from sleep disturbed by illness. Everything that constitutes any kind of artificial construct in ordinary life—through which a person becomes alienated from this life, through which they become estranged from reality—everything that people seek so earnestly out of folly, out of prejudice, in a false asceticism, in a false turning away from life, in a mystical twilight or even, indeed, in mystical total darkness, all of that must be banished from the activities of spiritual science. It is precisely this standing firmly within life, this face-to-face encounter with practical reality, that is the best preparation for entering the spiritual world.

[ 22 ] But once one has acquired a healthy sense of external reality—once one is no dreamer in this external reality, a fantasist, or a person unfit for life—in other words, once one has developed common sense and sound judgment—then one can also distinguish between illusion and reality in the borderlands between the sensory and spiritual worlds, where the threshold between the two worlds lies. That is why, in earlier times—to which I have just alluded—people took great care to ascertain whether those who joined such societies striving for higher knowledge had truly been prepared in such a way that they could actually withstand the intense struggle that common sense must face at the threshold between the sensory and spiritual worlds. For whoever lacks this common sense will be led astray and repelled precisely by what appears paradoxical—by what confronts them in a way entirely different from anything in the sensory world; they soon abandon the whole thing, just as one would put down a glowing coal after being burned by it, and they feel disappointed and—while seeking to enter the spiritual world—may become more and more opposed to all spiritual striving. These older associations wanted to be certain of their members.

[ 23 ] Such associations have continued their work right up to the present day; they still exist. Anthroposophy does not belong among them; Anthroposophy recognizes that in modern times, to a far greater extent than was the case in earlier eras, everything that concerns human beings must be subject to public scrutiny. After all, we hear—and with some justification—that there is a movement to replace even secret diplomacy with public diplomacy. The spirit of the times is moving toward public openness. But it is precisely this spirit of the times that animates anthroposophy. And only to the extent that—I would say, for the reasons discussed earlier, because certain preparations are necessary if one is to understand what lies ahead—only on such grounds do some aspects still retain the appearance of the old institutions; yet they strive to place themselves completely and utterly within the public sphere. For only this can make anthroposophy a link, an element of modern spiritual life—which is what must come to pass if anthroposophy is to place itself in the public sphere.

[ 24 ] But it is not only what I have just alluded to that is a distinctive feature of anthroposophy, but this inner spiritual experience itself—that which enables one to perceive the spiritual world in the same way that one perceives the physical world with the physical senses. This requires that one be able to relate to concepts, intuitions, images—to everything that fills the soul—in a somewhat different way than one relates to external reality. And in this realm, too, natural science has produced conceptual constructs which, in the form in which they have become popular through natural science, are unusable in spiritual science. They are unusable because the spiritual researcher very soon comes to the following realization: A concept, an idea, or a mental image is, in fact, as soon as one approaches spiritual facts and spiritual beings, never anything other than a reflection, a photograph, taken in the physical world—let us say, of a tree. If one takes an image of a tree from one side, an image from another side, and an image from a third side—these images all look different. They are all of one and the same tree, yet they all look different. And it is only by taking these images from the most diverse angles that one can, by holding them together, gain a true conception, an experience of reality. But people today do not appreciate this. Today, people prefer limited concepts. They prefer: Once you have a concept, you simply “have” it! Then you want to stick with it. Spiritual science cannot do that. Spiritual science describes the matter from the most diverse angles; it describes it from one angle and knows that in doing so it is providing only a one-sided picture—a photograph, so to speak, from a certain point of view; it then describes it from another angle, from a third angle, from a third point of view.

[ 25 ] Yes, what is even more striking is the following. If one truly wishes to become a scholar of the humanities, one must be deeply imbued with the maxim so beautifully expressed by Goethe: “The problem lies right in the middle between two opposing opinions.” — If one wishes to know the truth about a spiritual being or a spiritual fact, one must know not only what can be said in its favor, but also what can be said against it.

[ 26 ] Those of you here today who have heard me speak on several occasions will know that, in keeping with the spirit of spiritual science, it is my habit—whenever this or that topic comes up—not only to point out the arguments in favor of a matter but also to point out the arguments against it. And I always make a point of doing this, especially in more intimate lectures on the higher realms of anthroposophy. Thus, anyone who reads through my writings will find in them not only the grounds for certain spiritual facts and spiritual beings, but also the arguments that can be used to refute them. Only in this way can one gain a true experience.

[ 27 ] That, however, has led to some strange developments precisely in this anthroposophical field—developments that, under today’s circumstances, one can really only experience in this particular field. Precisely from among the ranks of the followers are people who have joined these ranks, who did not find what they were looking for there, who were not seeking work in the field of spiritual science but rather personal interests. They fell away; they then became opponents. All they had to do was copy down what is written in my own writings, what appears in my own lectures, and then they were able to refute anthroposophy in the most splendid way. It is precisely in this field that one has the best opportunity to “refute.” One does not even need to invent one’s own refutations; one need only copy the refutations that are readily available! This has, in fact, happened on a massive scale in recent times. In general, what often appears as opposition to anthroposophy from those who were once followers themselves exhibits peculiar characteristics—specifically, the characteristic that it rarely addresses the factual, but always turns to what distracts from the factual, to the personal, and takes on certain forms—I say this only as an aside— against which refutation is actually quite superfluous, for the very reason that those who put forward these arguments know best of all that they are saying things that are not true.

[ 28 ] But what I have just alluded to is a fundamental characteristic of anthroposophical research: to examine things from a wide variety of perspectives. Only in this way does one acquire that inner discipline of the soul which is necessary if one wishes not merely to live in abstract concepts, but to connect with spiritual realities. In this regard, an inner discipline of the soul is necessary—one of which those who educate themselves solely through the study of external nature via the natural sciences have absolutely no conception. They have no conception of it because they think they can simply transfer certain concepts and ideas derived from external nature to the spiritual realm, since they regard these as universally valid. But that is not possible.

[ 29 ] I would like to clarify my point with the following. Admittedly, this immediately introduces paradoxical concepts, but “paradoxical” only in relation to certain things that are widely held as contemporary prejudices, even if they are strongly believed. I am thinking, for example, of a lecture given in London at the beginning of this century by Professor Dewar. Professor Dewar, in a manner similar to that used by geologists and geognosts regarding the beginning of the Earth’s formation, attempted to develop concepts based on physics and chemistry concerning the possible end of the Earth. These concepts are entirely in keeping with genuine natural science and are extraordinarily insightful. When one traces how the Earth gradually cools and how the proportions of the various substances on Earth change as it cools, one arrives at certain insights that are valid within the limits of one’s observations. Then one extends these insights and asks: What will all this be like when millions of years have passed? — Well, one can be a truly ingenious physicist or chemist, and one arrives at the idea: It will be so cold—yes, so cold—that, in fact, no human being with their current constitution will be able to live on Earth; yet, one calculates this as a possible state of the Earth; one calculates, for example, what milk will look like. Milk will then be solid—it cannot be liquid at that time—and it will have a completely different color. One might find certain substances, such as egg white, with which one could then coat the walls, so that the walls become luminous, allowing one to read newspapers by their light. The professor of physics and chemistry has drawn all this from a beautiful conception. But anyone who has trained themselves on the basis of spiritual scientific methods must, through inner spiritual discipline, refrain from such conceptions; they cannot arrive at them. For how are they actually arrived at?

[ 30 ] Well, now I’ll turn to what is paradoxical in light of conventional ideas: If one observes how a child’s vital functions change, say, from the seventh or eighth to the ninth year, one gets a corresponding picture. One can then extrapolate to determine what the organs must look like in 150 years under the influence of this change. This is exactly the same method Professor Dewar used to calculate the Earth’s final state. However, when one applies it to human beings, one realizes: This organism will no longer exist in 150 years! And one fails to consider that what does not apply to human beings does not apply to the great macrocosm of the Earth either, and that the Earth will likewise perish before the state—which was very ingeniously calculated from physics—can come to pass. Similarly, one could calculate from the changes between the seventh and ninth years what the child was like 180 years ago—but it wasn’t even there yet! Geologists do this for the Earth; they calculate what the Earth looked like so many millions of years ago. But—the Earth hadn’t even been born yet.

[ 31 ] This sounds paradoxical, and as a researcher in the humanities, one must introduce concepts into the present day that already sound paradoxical—concepts that some might even consider crazy. But what is experienced through the humanities is precisely something that can provide discipline for the soul. And in order to be able to immerse oneself in the spiritual realm, one needs a discipline of the soul that can also reject certain concepts—a discipline that does not make calculations according to the same pattern one would follow if one were to say: “The person standing before me today existed as the very same person 200 years ago.” — The calculation would follow exactly the same pattern.

[ 32 ] I am well aware of how paradoxical what I am saying is. But if one does not point out such paradoxes, one simply cannot draw attention to what is so unsettling for some. When one crosses the threshold into the spiritual world, one cannot emphasize enough how much common sense must be at work in the transition from the physical to the spiritual world. But if one acquires such spiritual discipline and comes to connect with reality in this way, then—because such things affect the whole person—what the soul gains from this becomes an achievement of the whole soul; it becomes a disposition, it becomes a fundamental character trait, it becomes an essential aspect of the soul.

[ 33 ] But then the soul becomes capable of assessing how its own view—that is, what it must form as an opinion, a conception, or a worldview—relates to other views and other worldviews. Then the soul becomes inclined to understand the relationship between its own worldview and other ways of perceiving the world. One then comes to explore the various currents of thought, feeling, and experience that exist, not primarily to criticize them, but to immerse oneself in them. Such an attitude then expands into a capacity to evaluate all historical and contemporary developments in relation to human spiritual life.

[ 34 ] And only by grasping the disposition—this essential quality of the human soul—from the deepest impulses of anthroposophically oriented spiritual science can one assess the relationship between this spiritual science and religious creeds. Above all, anthroposophy seeks to understand these religious beliefs. The aim is to immerse oneself in them—not with a critical spirit, but by accepting them as they present themselves—in order to understand their right to exist and their intrinsic value. This is why anthroposophy is able to pass a fair judgment—even on past spiritual movements—in a completely different sense than other schools of thought often do.

[ 35 ] Let us first consider, in a more abstract realm, what is known as “Thomism” in the Middle Ages, or, in Greece, the philosophy of Aristotle. Anyone who today fits the common definition of a philosopher—or of a scientist in general—would say: Well, Aristotle is an old, outdated figure; Thomism—the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas—belongs to the Middle Ages.” —Anthroposophy knows that something special must emerge from the conditions and impulses of today’s zeitgeist; it does not seek to transplant what was right for an earlier epoch into the present one. But it understands, from within the conditions of those epochs, that which only those epochs could provide. And it understands this not merely externally, but internally and essentially; it understands it so essentially that it says to itself: In Thomistic philosophy, which was essentially a servant, a companion of Christianity at that time, there is something that could only have emerged from the spirit of that era. If one wishes to become competent, one must find one’s way into that which can arise only from the spirit of that time, not from the spirit of our own time. Anthroposophy therefore does not regard engaging with Thomism as a merely historical study, but rather regards what one gains through Thomism as something that can be gained only through it. This is very important. For it does not produce that vague, nebulous tolerance of which so much is spoken today, but rather it produces that inner, understanding tolerance which, while firmly grounded in the process of development, does not regard what has once developed as something to be discarded, but allows it to remain in its proper place, allowing it to stand in its own right within its ever-evolving reality. Some things in nature, and some things in spiritual life, must develop like plants that have only a one-year existence: they live out this one-year existence, and then develop another one-year existence. Other plants, however, continue to develop from one year into the next through their woody structure; they are perennial plants. So it is in spiritual culture as well. Much in spiritual culture must continue; it must be taken up in later times by those who truly wish to feel a sense of solidarity with the overall development of humanity. In this way, one can also gain an understanding of the relationship between anthroposophy and religious denominations—those religious denominations that believe, though only out of misunderstanding, that anthroposophy stands in opposition to them, that it stands in opposition to religious life in general as if it were some other religion.

[ 36 ] No, that is not the case. Anthroposophy knows full well that it can never become a religion, because it understands the course of time as it unfolds in concrete history, and because it knows that just as one cannot become a child again at the age of 60, so too humanity, in the age in which it now lives and in which it will live in the future, will not be able to form religions out of itself. Other eras belonged to the formation of religions. New religions no longer arise. Therefore, anthroposophy is particularly suited to discerning the absolute value and the absolute permanence of the religious creeds that have taken shape—that have taken shape in their own era. Anthroposophy would misunderstand itself if it believed it could establish a new religious creed. But religious creeds arose because people who did not yet possess within themselves those impulses, those forces that impel them toward anthroposophy—which people of the present possess far more of than they realize—because people who did not yet possess these were meant to receive manifestations, impressions from the spiritual world; thus the religions arose, which retain their value and can be understood precisely by anthroposophy, which is now also working its way up into the spiritual world in its own way.

[ 37 ] Thus, when properly understood, religion and anthroposophy can meet. Anthroposophy works from the human being outward, through the development of human powers, into the spirit—into that realm where religion places its revelations. Can one really be so unreligious as to believe that one has received religion as a truth from divine heights and that one must fear for it when a person strives—using the powers that, in any case, must also come from the Divine in a religious sense—to work their way up to the truth of the spiritual world? Does it not seem, from the very outset, to be truly religious to have no fear—knowing that religion contains revelations of the truth—and to have no fear that this truth will already be in harmony with the truth that a person finds for themselves through their spirit-given, spirit-bestowed powers?

[ 38 ] This is what one should bear in mind in the deepest sense if one wishes to correctly assess the relationship between religion and anthroposophy. In earlier times, human beings were not so predisposed, nor of such a nature, that they needed any path other than the religious path leading up into the spiritual world. Just as people in the Middle Ages had no need for the Copernican worldview, they had no need for anthroposophy. Today they need it because humanity is evolving. But what has once been given to humanity—what entered into humanity through certain forces that existed only in certain eras—retains its value.

[ 39 ] In this regard, however, there is a complete contrast precisely between anthroposophy and the modern intellectual movement that I referred to earlier as the scientific one—about which I had to say: It owes its most brilliant results, its value, precisely to the fact that its methods are not suited to leading to the spiritual. — But what have we seen specifically in the realm of natural science? Certain people with a scientific mindset have emerged who, I would say, have allowed themselves to be swept away by the profound, suggestive impression that brilliant scientific methods make regarding external nature, and have built a creed upon it. Do we not see how a brilliant man of scientific thought, David Friedrich Strauss, sought to construct a religion out of natural science itself? Do we not see how even Eduard von Hartmann speaks of a “self-destruction of Christianity” and seeks to establish a religion of the future, purely out of reason, purely out of the reason of philosophy?

[ 40 ] Anthroposophy could not fall into such errors because entirely different forces lead to anthroposophy, and because it would regard the attempt to found a religion as tantamount to wanting, at a certain age—say, 50—to do the same thing a child does. Although what a child does need not be any less valuable than what an older person does. Anthroposophy knows that the time for creating religions is over. Therefore, it will devote its energies precisely to understanding religions and guiding people ever more deeply into an understanding of them.

[ 41 ] Now it must be said: Just as, in anthroposophy, the soul strives into the spiritual world out of its own powers—namely, out of its powers of cognition—but not merely out of the cognitive powers of the head, but out of the cognitive powers of the whole soul—so the religions did not strive in this way. They strove toward it in such a way that one can say: While anthroposophy proceeds from the human being and strives upward into the spiritual world, the religions proceeded from the premise of receiving that which came to them as if through a gracious revelation. But this has a different effect on the human soul; it fills the human soul differently than that which is created out of one’s own powers. Anthroposophically oriented spiritual science is a science. But what acts there as a truth of faith grips the soul in a different way than a truth of knowledge—as anthroposophical truth must also be. One cannot immediately turn anthroposophy into a religion. But from a truly understood anthroposophy, a genuinely authentic, true, and sincere religious need will also arise. For the human soul is not monolithic; rather, the human soul is multifaceted. The human soul needs various paths to ascend toward its goal. The human soul needs not only the path through the powers of cognition; the human soul also needs to be imbued and warmed by that way of relating to the spiritual world as it is found in religious confession and in truly religious feeling.

[ 42 ] One thing has always been strange. Over the years, I have received many letters here from Switzerland that always had a very specific tone. These letters said something like this: I can certainly understand what you’re aiming for with your anthroposophically oriented spiritual science, and I can also see the merit in entering the spiritual world in this way—not everyone writes this way, but there are those who do—but I find one thing missing in this spiritual science: I miss the fact that it leads one into Christian experiences in such an intimate way as—and here this or that sectarian movement is cited—

[ 43 ] Yes, people want to express a shortcoming of this spiritual science, this anthroposophy, in this way. In my view, the expression of this shortcoming is always the expression of a particular virtue. For people demand of anthroposophy something that, by its very nature, it does not wish to be. But by its very nature, it seeks to grant others their due as well. People take offense when one leaves another path open for them. That is what is peculiar about it. And so pastors and ministers today take offense when one leaves open a path that anthroposophy itself does not wish to take. Then come refutations from that side, which say: “You’re saying something completely different about Christ than we are”—one isn’t saying anything different; one is merely saying something in greater detail—I can’t go into this in more detail now, due to time constraints—so you’re not on the right path; you must be refuted. — Yes, but what if the situation were such that one were to say precisely what he does not say, and allow him his full right to say what he can know, what lies on his path. He attacks one precisely for that very reason—the very reason one wants to give him due credit, the very reason one does everything so that he may first take his rightful place. On the one hand, one is resented for not solving the other’s task, because one leaves it to him. If one were to say something else, one would also be resented. And so the paradox arises—this very strange situation arises—where one is refuted precisely on the point that is the innermost nerve, the very thing the other should perceive as a blessing! Because anthroposophy does not wish to interfere with the unique nature of religious denominations—because it grants them the right to act of their own accord within their own sphere—it therefore says something else, something that is not said in that sphere. It does what it does to demonstrate the legitimacy of religious denominations. It evidently cannot do more to allow religious denominations to hold their own ground. And that is precisely why it is attacked. It is demanded that it take on the task of religion. In this realm, a whole body of clear ideas ought actually to replace vague notions.

[ 44 ] One might say: A certain start has been made—a very good one—in the excellent work that Ricarda Huch has written on “Luther’s Faith.” In addition to many other excellent insights one can gain from this book, it also provides a sense of the very different character of the path of the heart that religious confession takes, as distinct from the path of knowledge itself. The nature of the truth of faith is something that shines through on every page of this book, alongside other excellent insights. Now, however, in our present age, precisely when deeper truths are spoken, they are generally trivialized, for everyone believes they don’t need much to delve into the depths of this or that matter—they already consider themselves experts. Ricarda Huch actually made a beautiful observation regarding the way in which Nietzsche followers sprang up everywhere a few years ago, because people believed they had what it took to be just like him, as he is portrayed by this or that writer. People do not want to work their way up; they do not want to struggle their way up; rather, above all else, when someone describes a “superman,” they want to be a superman right away! And so one saw these “supermen” running around, running around in large numbers everywhere: those who did not even have the makings of a respectable guinea pig; they ran around as “blond beasts” in Nietzsche’s sense.

[ 45 ] Anthroposophy is a path—as demanded by the present age—upward into the spiritual world, one that supports the aspirations of religious denominations and religious experience in general. People also judge the outward course of history far too superficially. They think that, in broader circles, religion no longer has the influence it once had in earlier times, and that religion must therefore be restored to the form it took in ancient times. They believe they are doing religion a favor by fighting what they consider to be its opponents. They do not delve into the deeper aspects. If one were to examine the truly deeper reasons and study why, for example—as was noted in 1873—only one-third of the population of France, rural and urban combined, was religious in the ecclesiastical sense—only one-third, while two-thirds were non-believers—if one were to take the matter seriously and study these things, one would say to oneself: It is not for these superficial reasons, but rather out of deep spiritual impulses, that a lack of interest has arisen—not only toward individual religions, but toward spiritual reality in general. A materialistic age has dawned.

[ 46 ] Anthroposophy teaches the following about the course of human evolution: While one evolutionary current is unfolding, another is unfolding in the background—more invisible, more imperceptible. For example, while the tendency toward materialism, spiritual emptiness, and the denial of the spirit was unfolding, needs and deep interests—to find a path into the spiritual world—were developing in the subconscious—people were simply unaware of this—in the subconscious depths of human souls. And so a person could, in his intellect, be a David Friedrich Strauss, a denier of God and the spirit; yet in his sleeping soul—the soul of which he knew nothing—forces were developing that can only be cultivated through a direct path, a direct path of knowledge—namely, the anthroposophical path—provided one finds it. But then, through this detour, one finds one’s way back to religious faith, whereas one abandons religious faith when one clings solely to the dazzling advances of natural science.

[ 47 ] How, then, have those scientific schools of thought—which, I would say, have developed solely under the influence of the natural sciences—actually related to religious development? Quite differently from anthroposophy. Anthroposophy seeks to understand religious creeds. Because religious creeds speak of the spirit, and anthroposophy, based on the results of its research, recognizes spiritual facts and spiritual beings, it finds common ground with religious creeds. Other schools of thought take a different approach. I would like to cite the example of the psychologist Ebbinghaus: He investigates how religion arose; drawing on his mind, which was trained in the natural sciences, and on his capacity for judgment, he investigates how religion arose. Well, I will briefly summarize what he says: In earlier times, when people did not yet possess the enlightened thinking of the present, they found themselves exposed to dangers in the outer world—such as rain, thunderstorms, and the like; they found that hostile forces were at work. Out of fear, they invented demonic spiritual beings to explain these phenomena. Furthermore, they realized that they could not overcome these forces in any other way because they were too weak. Out of necessity, they invented gods to help them.

[ 48 ] Well, such things sound quite nice, and anyone accustomed to today’s common notions finds it easy to accept them. But one is proceeding from a completely false notion when one says over and over again that the primitive man, like a child, is inclined to personify table corners, to endow them with a soul; when he bumps into one, he strikes the table corner. He does not at all endow the table corner with a soul, but rather he does not yet know the difference between the inanimate and the living, and out of an inner impulse he strikes at the inanimate; it does not ascribe a soul to anything at all. Likewise, the primitive man does not ascribe a soul to anything, but follows his instincts; and it is not true that he always seeks to explain whatever stands in his way as hostile or harmful by inventing a demon. I’d like to know this: if a good-for-nothing boy somehow becomes a danger to a wild man—I don’t believe at all that he’d immediately invent a demon with which to defend himself against the boy, but rather he’d simply beat him to death.

[ 49 ] These things seem paradoxical again. But they can only be properly assessed by spiritual science or anthroposophy. Spiritual science knows how to grasp the facts correctly: that the child is actually not yet predisposed to religion, any more than the savage is. People see something childlike in religion. Yet it is precisely the child who is not predisposed to religion; rather, the child must first be educated or brought up in the faith. This is also how human beings have been brought up in the course of human evolution. A saying by Ebbinghaus goes like this: first, he says, “Fear and need are the mothers of religion.” — Then he says: “Churches fill up and pilgrimages increase in times of war and during devastating epidemics.” I would like to know whether churches also fill up during epidemics and times of war among those who are, from the outset, entirely materialistically inclined. They fill up only among those who already possess, in some way, a religious disposition. But this does not stem from fear and distress; it stems from the fact that human beings experience the spiritual in their souls. In ancient times, they experienced it more instinctively. Today, they can experience it more consciously. Because human beings are gradually developing the capacity to experience the spiritual, they see in the sensory world a reflection of the spiritual.

[ 50 ] If one wishes to describe the connection that the human soul has with its environment—that is, when it encounters the spiritual realm through its spiritual organs—but wishes to do so only by means of an analogy, one might say: It is a kind of compassion. We know compassion from our moral sense; it is a kind of love. This connection with the spiritual world can be compared to the feeling of love. And so anthroposophy can say: Even though primitive religions arose out of need and anxiety, they became filled with spiritual content—with concepts, images, and ideas of the spiritual world—because human beings live within such a world. Perfect religions—above all, the religion that is the synthesis, the unification of the other religions—did not develop out of fear and distress; they developed out of what one might call spiritualized love, a growing together with the spiritual world. It is not fear and distress, but love that actually gives rise to perfect religious creeds.

[ 51 ] Thus, it must be said: Those who allow themselves to be guided solely by materialistic and scientific concepts fail to understand the entire relationship between religion and truth as known through knowledge. It bears repeating time and again: If one stands firmly on the ground of religious truth, then one may assume that when a person approaches the spiritual world from another perspective, understanding—and even support—is possible. And so one will experience this more and more—even if people are unwilling to admit it today—that while, under the influence of the human impulses that find their expression in the modern scientific worldview, religions felt weakened and religious convictions felt paralyzed, they will, in turn, be recognized for their value, their dignity, and their significance for humanity precisely when people are able to approach the spirit through the path of spiritual science. It is precisely the representatives of religion who should be friends of anthroposophically oriented spiritual science.

[ 52 ] They will become so as well. For the conflict between religion and science does not arise from certain religious premises. This conflict between religion and science arose because, essentially, the representatives of religious denominations in earlier times were also the representatives of science. One must certainly acknowledge this fact. One need not go very far back in the history of human development to find that those who were the representatives of religion were at the same time the ones who taught people the secular sciences. They were connected to these secular sciences. Only over the course of time did the external sciences—those based on natural science—emancipate themselves from religion. This emancipation has an impact on intellectual developments worldwide.

[ 53 ] It is only human nature that understanding of such matters lags behind. It was not until 1822 that the Catholic Church repealed the decrees condemning the teachings of Copernicus and Galileo. Only then were Catholics permitted to believe in the Copernican worldview. Perhaps it will take centuries—if it ever comes to that—for such a decree, such a view, to be repealed, prohibiting Catholics from believing in repeated earthly lives. But this repeal will come. For what is truly human religious experience will not conflict with the belief in repeated earthly lives, any more than it does with the Copernican worldview.

[ 54 ] Time and time again, I must take this opportunity to recall that priest who was also a university professor and who, upon assuming the rectorship at the University of Vienna, said in a speech about Galileo as a Catholic priest: A religion that is properly understood will not rebel against scientific progress; on the contrary, religious truth will feel firmly supported by the fact that it can say: When astronomy reaches out into the vastness of the starry world and discovers its laws, this too arises from the glory and power of the divine essence and divine being. A Copernicus did not contribute to the undermining of religion, but through his work contributed to the glory of the revelation of the divine essence. — These are words from a priest that are quite different from those that arise time and again out of misunderstanding and that are directed against precisely what must occur in the history of human development.

[ 55 ] I have already pointed out how strange it is that people are required not only to accept as Christianity, for example, whatever one or another representative of this or that denomination says about Christ Jesus, but also to refrain from saying anything else. Experience shows that anthroposophy truly cannot be accused of disrupting any religious creed. But it must recognize, precisely in connection with that important—indeed, the most important—turning point in the history of the Earth’s development, which is marked by Christ Jesus, something that has true significance for the entire universe. It has entirely different things to say about the Christ impulse than what has been said so far. People hold it against it that it seeks to contribute even more to the foundation and understanding of Christianity than the official representatives do. One need only realize just how strange such a struggle actually is. One need only realize how ill-equipped one is to meet the challenges of the times if one is so unwilling to understand that anthroposophy can never undermine true religious faith, but can only deepen it. Then, indeed, one needs an attitude such as that expressed by Bishop Ireland in these words: “Religion requires new forms and ways of understanding in order to connect with the modern age.” We need apostles of thought and action.

[ 56 ] Yes, even within religious denominations there are those who are able to sense and perceive the signs of the times. They even demand that a different path be offered to them. For they understand that if humanity loses interest in the spirit, then interest in religion must also be lost. But if humanity gains an interest in the spiritual in a way that is in keeping with its present stage of development, then the religious denominations, too, must arrive at the correct understanding. Hence, one can always observe the following: While in recent times people have often been led away from their experience of this or that religious denomination by one-sidedly developed natural science, they are once again being led back to it as the spirit is permeated by anthroposophical spiritual science.

[ 57 ] If one were to truly and seriously seek to understand how anthroposophy interprets the workings of the Spirit in the various religious creeds, how it can be understood that one religious tradition arose from these conditions and another from those conditions, and how anthroposophy is able to assess the value of the individual religious traditions using its own methods—one would never want to oppose anthroposophy from this very perspective.

[ 58 ] People today tend to dwell on abstractions. They say that anthroposophy seeks the core of truth in all religions, and that it thereby essentially makes all religions the same. If that were the case, it would not be a true history of development; it would be akin to something one could never do in external reality—if one has salt, pepper, and sugar on the table and says, “These are all food ingredients; they are all essentially the same”—well, then one might put pepper in one’s coffee instead of sugar. That is not the case; it is an external judgment to say that anthroposophy seeks to recognize the core of truth in all religions as roughly the same. Rather, it seeks to understand how one religion has developed out of another. It seeks to understand how essential is that religious creed which aims to satisfy all people across the earth in the one Spirit—how this constitutes the synthesis, the unifying connection of the various religious creeds distributed among the individual peoples. It speaks, along with Frobenius, of ethnic religions and of the religion of humanity.

[ 59 ] I would have much more to say if I wanted to address all the misunderstandings—which are piling up more and more, sometimes out of superficiality, sometimes out of malice, and sometimes even out of good intentions—aimed specifically at condemning and combating anthroposophy from the perspective of religious denominations; I would have to cite much if I wanted to demonstrate the nature of these misunderstandings. The relationship between religious life and anthroposophy can therefore only become clear when one grasps how anthroposophy takes hold of a person, how anthroposophy awakens a person to the spiritual world, and how, through this, the person becomes capable of once again sensing what they can experience in community—in religious community. If anthroposophy is opposed by the religions, then it must defend itself. Observe where anthroposophy becomes polemical, and you will always see: it is in self-defense. Anthroposophy becomes aggressive or offensive only in the rarest of cases; only where a misunderstanding has given rise to something that must be removed—removed as a misunderstanding. Otherwise, however, anthroposophy never becomes aggressive; it does so only when it has to defend itself. It does, in fact, have to defend itself very often: for example, when—as I already mentioned at the beginning of my remarks today—people repeatedly refuse to engage with what anthroposophy actually is, with what can be found within it, when they do not seriously, honestly, and sincerely familiarize oneself with it, but instead creates a caricature and then attacks that caricatured image—which, in truth, does not truly target those who assert their anthroposophical research out of their innermost conviction!

[ 60 ] I did not intend to examine the relationship between anthroposophy and religious denominations through specific details, but rather from the perspective of the whole, comprehensive spirit of the anthroposophical worldview. I wanted to show that for anyone who understands anthroposophy, there can be no question of any religious experience being disrupted by this anthroposophy. In this regard, too, what I said yesterday still applies: I would most like to call the worldview that has emerged for me—the anthroposophical one, which grew out of Goethe’s sound conceptions of the world—Goetheanism, and if it were up to me alone, I would most like to call the building in Dornach the Goetheanum.

[ 61 ] Everything one can find within the realm of anthroposophy actually always leads one to the realization: You are merely continuing what this unique spirit has brought into the development of humanity. In many respects, he remained at the level of elemental concepts. But one is not, in the true sense, a follower of Goetheanism—a follower of the worldview that came into being through Goethe, that Goethe brought to life—if one considers, from a historical or superficially biographical perspective, what Goethe himself wrote down; but one is a true adherent of the Goethean worldview only when one is able to immerse oneself vividly in this worldview and carry it forward further and further.

[ 62 ] Goethe was a follower of Goethe until 1832, here in the physical world. He himself would express himself quite differently today than he did in his own time. But when something is healthy, certain fundamental impulses and forces remain, which carry a worldview from one epoch into the next. When—I would say—what was there in its infancy blossoms anew and bears fresh fruit, then this may point to the solidarity of humanity’s entire development—indeed, to the fact that it takes up certain fundamental impulses. And so I may also conclude today’s reflections by, I might say, bringing to the fore Goethe’s well-known profession of faith—one that I, too, have often expressed.

[ 63 ] Goethe, observing what art and religion can be to human beings—but also what science makes of human beings—considers the person who does not allow a pseudo-science, a false religion, or a false art to influence them, but rather true art, true science, and true religion; he considers this person and then utters these profoundly meaningful words:

Whoever possesses science and art,
Also possesses religion.
Whoever does not possess those two,
Let him have religion.

[ 64 ] Applied to the case of anthroposophy, I might perhaps continue this quote from Goethe in a way that is relevant to our times:

[ 65 ] Whoever possesses anthroposophy—and the spiritual science that blossoms from it—also possesses religion. My only fear is that those who do not wish to possess anthroposophy, or at least its spirit and meaning, will no longer have religion in the future.