The Rudolf Steiner Archive

15. The Humanities as a Source of Healing

[ 1 ] Last time, I took the liberty of saying a few words about the purpose or significance of a theosophical branch. What I said then is truly something that one cannot emphasize strongly enough to those who are part of the theosophical movement or who wish to participate in what is today called Theosophy. Nothing is more common today than opposition—the struggle against mere theory, against mere doctrine—and, on the other hand, the longing for life, for sensation and feeling, for that which is neither theory nor doctrine; for no era has been so entangled in theories, doctrines, and dogmas—without people really being aware of it—as the present one.

[ 2 ] That seems to be a strong claim, and yet I would like to stand by it, even in the face of those who object: Isn’t that the Dark Ages, the era of dogmatism, and haven’t we moved beyond that? This week you will find a well-known magazine on display, the front page of which discusses a book about Christianity written by the philosopher Eduard von Hartmann. It is not sufficiently obvious to us today to engage with the ideas in this work. But a well-known advocate for the current renewal of Christian ideas has expressed thoughts in *Zukunft* in connection with this work—thoughts that certainly give pause for thought, because they are so widespread in our present day. Jentsch states, in fact, that in this work Hartmann essentially said something that, while it had often been said before, was restated by the logical mind of Eduard von Hartmann as clearly as possible, so that everyone now knows that we can never again have anything to do with any theoretical, systematic, or doctrinal justification of religious views or truths. The era in which religion was philosophically or theologically justified is over. We know today with absolute certainty—and in saying this, he expresses something that will resonate in many hearts—that all systems of thought become entangled in contradictions and that, in truth, only life—which looks upward toward a world beyond, toward a divine world order—can be of any interest to us at all.

[ 3 ] The good man does not realize that, although he rejects all other forms of dogmatism, two or three dogmas—even if they remain merely abstract—hold a certain value for him. He wants to cast off all dogmatism, and yet he is precisely a dogmatist of the most pronounced kind. Admittedly, one does not want to be a dogmatist, and yet one is one without realizing just how much of a dogmatist one is. This has also led to all similar movements—be it the “Giordano Bruno League” or the “Society for Ethical Culture”—adopting, to a greater or lesser extent, a strictly doctrinal stance; in other words, they are more concerned with spreading doctrines. Whether these teachings concern proper moral conduct, monism, or a reform of our religious instruction in schools—which is to be replaced by moral instruction that ultimately boils down to a specific moral dogma (for something must be taught after all)—the result remains the same. Thus, the old dogmas are replaced by new ones—by the dogmas of liberalism. Everywhere, it comes down to the doctrine; everywhere, to the content of the word.

[ 4 ] This is by no means necessary in the Theosophical Movement. I wanted to emphasize this in particular: no matter what we teach, no matter what one person or another writes or teaches in their books—even if these are lofty truths, and even if there are many people who feel drawn to such truths because they present a coherent worldview and so on—that is not what matters in the Theosophical Movement. What matters is not what we teach, what we claim, or what we say, but rather how we live together within the Theosophical Movement and what kind of attitude we cultivate. This mindset, which we are to develop and which we wish to develop, is that within our soul there lives a consciousness of spiritual agency—the awareness that thoughts, sensations, and feelings are just as real forces in the world as magnetism, electricity, light, or steam power. A true Theosophist, in the true sense of the word, is not one who merely admits that there is some truth in the ideas disseminated in our literature, but one who unites with his fellow human beings through the awareness that arises again and again within his soul: that when he thinks, feels, or wills something—even if it may not even translate into an outward action—it still has an effect.

[ 5 ] And when any one of us speaks somewhere to a congregation that meets him with this awareness, then his words are quite different from those of any other lecturer or speaker. For then you will be sitting here with the awareness that not only is your physical body, which is here, something real, but that your sensations, feelings, and thoughts passing through your mind are just as present as your physical body. And when, with this awareness, you cross the threshold and take in the words spoken here, those words will find the path they are meant to take into the world. The words of the theosophist are not spoken so that one person or another may agree or disagree with them. It is not primarily a matter of whether they are true or not, but rather the fact that they are forces. No matter how beautiful and outstanding the thoughts an individual may express in his words, that is of lesser importance; what matters most is through which channels these thoughts flow. A Theosophical Lodge or a Theosophical Branch is the starting point of numerous channels through which these spoken thoughts find their way out into the whole world.

[ 6 ] But these words will be heard in this way only if the listeners are aware of a spiritual world. Then the speaker’s powers are amplified by the consciousness of everyone present; the spiritual forces are like those in an electric battery, and they radiate out into the world like waves, taking effect wherever the opportunity arises. Everything depends on this attitude, this consciousness, and this way of living the teaching—not on the content. Our teachings are drawn from the contemplation of the great spiritual interconnections of existence and from the contemplation of the nature of the human being. The goal is not that we know them, but that they take effect. And this effect is important for the reason that these thoughts are the very same ones through which, for millions of years—indeed, ever since time began—everything in the world has come to pass. And just as surely as these thoughts have made the world what it is today, so surely will these same thoughts make the world in the future what it is meant to be and must become.

[ 7 ] But there is one factor that must come into play for the right things to happen in the future, and that factor is called “human beings”; that factor is called “human beings who are aware and conscious.” We can say: There was a time when the great ideas of the world order were brought into reality by what we call the gods. Back then, human beings were still completely unconscious. Back then, human beings could not yet participate in the building of the world. You see, human beings are now at the beginning of the development of their consciousness. They will move toward times in which this consciousness will reach ever wider and wider spheres. As a result, he will be increasingly called upon to participate in what the gods once did. That is why we call our theosophy “Divine Wisdom”—because we derive our wisdom from there, and because we must play our part if we wish to shape our future world accordingly.

[ 8 ] In the future, human beings will be called upon, in a broader sense, to participate more consciously than they do today. Just as today’s society creates for itself a moral world order, so too will a time come when spiritual forces will flow through the human soul to a much greater degree than today, and the rigid social order will have a much deeper, more intense meaning. And just as humanity today uses the laws of nature only superficially to bring about what is alive and active in industry, so a time will come when humanity will use the spiritual laws of the world to shape our institutions. By applying the great universal laws, humanity will gain mastery over health and illness. A divine essence dwells within every human being. This divine essence is at the very beginning of its development, and the goal of Theosophy—or “Divine Wisdom”—is to bring this divine essence to the fore and transform it into a creative force. Theosophy exists not to satisfy the curiosity of those who simply wish to know something about God, but to give humanity the strength to fulfill its task as a being in the process of becoming divine. Although this will not happen in a single moment, it will become increasingly clear to us.

[ 9 ] What I would now like to summarize in a single sentence may seem quite peculiar to some, but it is nonetheless a truth that the occultist knows just as, for example, a natural scientist knows any other truth—any external truth. Such a truth exists. I have already drawn attention to this in the twenty-seventh issue of *Lucifer-Gnosis*. It is connected to health in the world. It is, however, a truth in the spiritual sense, and the connection is not so obvious. Ultimately, it is absolutely true that a healthy outer physical body is the result of an inner life of the spirit lived in truth. To put it more clearly, though from a somewhat more distant perspective: A Theosophical Lodge, a Theosophical branch, is also a source of health. As you sit together here in the spirit I have spoken of, and take into your consciousness those truths that are meant to be nothing other than an echo of the great world-thoughts that created the harmonies of the world, the true thoughts of the world tremble and vibrate through your soul. And just as it is true that everything physical is an effect of the spirit, so it is true that the condition of the physical will be determined by the vibrations, by the waves that now tremble through your soul. If the thoughts that stimulate the vibrations of your soul are healthy, then these will also stimulate the physical vibrations, and these must then be healthy. By radiating these waves in all directions throughout the world, we create a source of health. A source of health emanates from the Theosophical Lodges. You may not notice this restoration of health in your life tomorrow or the day after. But in the future, you may find that health is the result of your present striving for truth. For future generations, we build healthy bodies by allowing our souls to cultivate the truth in spiritual life. In this way, we place ourselves within the flow of time; we place ourselves within the course of the world when we have the right faith.

[ 10 ] Many people say: What harm has materialism done us? It has brought us many magnificent institutions and, at all the gatherings of natural scientists and physicians, so much knowledge and insight into life. There you can hear so much about life. You can hear how magnificent the advances in hygiene are, and so on—how much lower the mortality rate is today than a century ago. All of this has been brought to us by the study of the laws of nature, a study that deals with pure matter. But you must also look deeper. You must see that the exterior does not always correspond to the interior, and that the exterior is a very deceptive indicator of the interior.

[ 11 ] Yes, we do not deny that great and magnificent things have been created in our age of materialism. But who created them? Here we come to a point that teaches us the difference between what a person merely thinks—what lives only in the human mind—and what lies deep within the core of his soul. You must make a strict distinction between these two things. You go through the world and carry out your daily tasks according to what you think today. But what you think today is based on a foundation that did not originate today. What you think today is rooted in a deeper wellspring of the soul, which is the result of the past. Even viewed purely from an external perspective, the materialist thinkers of the nineteenth century themselves grew out of the thinking of the past. You see: they were educated in schools that had not yet succumbed to materialism. The great teachers of materialism—such as Büchner, Vogt, and Moleschott—where did they learn, and how is it that their books have something so seductive about them? It is because their schooling took place at a time when society had not yet been so thoroughly gripped by materialism. In truth, we carry within us, as the foundation of our soul, what we were in previous lives. Drawing on deep wisdom, Indian philosophy tells us: What you think today, you will be tomorrow. This applies to human beings and to all facts and beings in the world. Today, our thinking rests on the surface. Today, we are what we thought in times past.

[ 12 ] They believe that we have overcome the past. People speak of the gray, dark Middle Ages. But it is precisely the early days of the Middle Ages that lie deep within our souls as our very essence. Back then, we lived in a previous incarnation. What we think today will only become who we are in a future incarnation. We should not be surprised that we think materialistically, yet have reaped fruits that are the result of earlier epochs. What we have today is merely the result of an age that we are inclined to look down upon with scorn and derision. It was from this deep insight that the impulse arose which led to the Theosophical Movement in the last third of the nineteenth century.

[ 13 ] We see before us today the fruits of earlier times and earlier ways of thinking. But those who keep watch over the signs of the times know that life in the future depends on our thoughts, on what we hold in our souls today. This future will be an ever-accelerating unfolding of life. You must be clear that life does not proceed at the same pace in all eras. All of you sitting here have heard many theosophical lectures, and I may therefore often speak a word drawn from deeper wisdom. We know that, besides the physical plane, there is the astral plane, and those who know the higher life can also predict the course of development in this higher world and trace the path of progress.

[ 14 ] If one compares the period from Charlemagne to the end of the eighteenth century with the period from the beginning of the nineteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth century—that is, a millennium versus a century—one notices the surprising fact that roughly the same thing happened in both time periods. The wave of human progress moved ten times faster, and it will move faster and faster in the time to come. Therefore, we must prepare ourselves for the fact that the things our thoughts conjure up will become external reality in the not-too-distant future. This shows you the impulse from which the Theosophical Movement sprang.

[ 15 ] The next generation will owe its recovery to our ideas, just as we owe the progress we have made to previous generations. Those who view the Theosophical Movement in this light may call it “prophetic in nature.” But prophets have always been—and had to be—those who truly sought to guide the course of events. For in order to determine what is to happen in the future, on a grand scale, one must first know what is lawful for that future. The great individuals who know what is beneficial for the future have therefore given us the opportunity to rediscover what had long been forgotten—namely, the great laws of the universe—and to enable us to internalize them for the spiritual and physical healing of our people and our race. Take this quite literally: true thoughts have a healing physical effect, and the thoughts awakened in the Theosophical Lodge through the vibrations of our souls are healing powers that pulse through humanity. Feel this truth—this truth of life—with your whole soul, and feel the importance of the Theosophical Movement; then you will move on to another chapter and be enabled to comprehend it.

[ 16 ] There are many among us who say: Yes, the Theosophical Movement promotes a beautiful, lofty ethic; it promotes beautiful teachings that are internally consistent. But one should stick to that and not look beyond it, confusing people with mystical, mysterious, abstract, and mental worlds. How many are there in the Theosophical Society who say: Let us be content with the astral and mental realms; let us develop the consciousness of oneness. A certain reluctance can be observed toward what we know as the doctrine of the astral and mental realms. But it must be stated once and for all: Anyone who sought to exclude this teaching about the higher worlds from the Theosophical Movement acted contrary to the intentions that the great individualities—whom we call the Masters—have given us. We might as well abandon the Theosophical Movement altogether if we banish the teaching about the higher worlds from it. Certainly, one can speak today of an ethics, of an ethical doctrine. Schools are already seeking to introduce this ethical doctrine. Ethical societies have been founded that attempt to establish and introduce general human duties without regard to this or that worldview, or this or that religious creed. But duties can only be established based on what one knows. Take a look, however, at these teachings on duty. They are a faithful reflection, a perfect imprint of the material age in which we live. What you find in the new duties proposed by the new Enlighteners is nothing other than the consequence of a materialistic worldview—the consequence of what the eyes can see, the ears can hear, and the hands can touch. This is certainly idealism, and one can be a noble idealist in this realm—without a doubt. But this is the ultimate consequence, the final outcome of a materialistic age.

[ 17 ] And because even those who believe themselves to be idealists—who strive with their thoughts and feelings toward a higher world and wish to preserve at least a vague inkling of such a world—fall back immediately into materialistic patterns of thought as soon as they begin to think, feel, and act, rather than merely talk. Since there are many such people in the Theosophical Movement as well, the idea is spreading within it that we should limit ourselves to a materialistic ethic, to a sense of unity that cannot be grasped and that people do not want to grasp, because they are afraid of engaging with the higher worlds in a certain way.

[ 18 ] Even the Theosophists, who say that one should not speak of the astral and mental planes, point out that a certain body of theosophical truths can be disseminated through the intellect alone. They also wish to refer to that which is the deeper essence and foundation of all reality merely as a Divine principle underlying all realities. But to behold it themselves, to grasp it, to confront it as it is—they shrink from that. That would be just as if someone were to say: Yes, there is such a thing as electrical force; let’s admit that; but to apply it, to study it in order to construct electrical machines and so on—we don’t want to get involved in that. That’s dangerous; we might get confused; it presents a different picture to the world. But such a person does not truly confront the electrical force. Rather, the one who truly confronts it is the one who says, “I want to get to know the electrical force in every respect so that I can bring it into existence and apply it in the external devices of humankind.” The first type of adherent to electric power would be akin to the theosophist who says, “Let us not concern ourselves with the astral and mental worlds, but only with the consciousness of unity.” He would not apply spiritual power to the immediate present.

[ 19 ] But if we do not want merely to dream of the Divine, or merely to have intuitions about it, or merely to talk about it and, at most, feel it vaguely, but rather to translate it into reality, then we must come to know it in detail in its various forms, as it reveals itself in the higher worlds; and then we can penetrate into the higher worlds. Just as it is true that we master our physical world by coming to know the individual forms of electrical force, so too do we come to know our life as a tangible reality when we make this force our own. Through human beings, this force—which today is realized in the world only by universal beings—is to be consciously realized and mastered in the future.

[ 20 ] It is not to satisfy our curiosity that we look into the spiritual world; it is not in vain that we seek to open the eyes of the spirit and the soul to those beings who do not live in physical bodies but who act, as it were, through our passions, instincts, and inner spiritual forces. It is not for nothing that we rise to the beings whose bodies are not physical—whose bodies are woven from the same substance as our thoughts—to the beings we call the beings of the mental world. We rise to them in order to learn what must be woven into the world in which we live. It is a fundamental truth that the spirit is always present. When you see a flower, you do not see merely the physical object—modern science, of course, wants nothing to do with this: this flower is spirit, and its sensory form is merely the expression of the spirit. I have often said: If you have a body of water and you allow the water to cool more and more, ice forms. Someone then comes along and says: Ice is real water, just in a different form. Then another person comes along and says: “But that’s not water at all; it’s solid, not liquid.” Everyone knows that ice is water that has contracted, been shaped by cold, and taken on a different form. The situation with the flower is quite similar. In this flower, you have nothing but spirit in a different form. Just as you can transform ice back into water, so too can you dissolve the flower into its spiritual essence. Our physical world is nothing other than astral and mental essence that has taken on a solid form. All of you sitting here are also mental entities, expressing yourselves in condensed form through your physical bodies. If you wish to act effectively, you must understand these forces. If you want to create ice, you must have cold and water. If you want to shape the physical world in the right way, you must understand the spirit.

[ 21 ] We must explore the powers of the spirit, not to satisfy our curiosity about the higher worlds or to learn all sorts of interesting things, but because we derive from them the knowledge we need for our daily lives. What is still astral today will be physical in the future; and what is still mental today will be astral in the future and physical in the even more distant future. By speaking of the astral realm today in a Theosophical Lodge and allowing these astral truths to permeate our souls and generate vibrations within them, these souls will in the future incarnate as human beings who are predisposed to the astral realm. When we are then incarnated on Earth again, these truths will flow forth from us. What has descended into our souls as parts, as children of the astral world, will then take physical form through us. We are here to bring down from the higher worlds the laws governing our actions and our lives. Therefore, the question cannot be whether one person or another finds it pleasing to ascend to the higher worlds, but merely whether we should and must ascend. That we are to ascend, that another age is to come which will spiritualize the world and spread spiritual views among humanity—this was the insight of the great beings who inspired the Theosophical Movement.

[ 22 ] The age that lies behind us—the epoch in which humanity became material—was preceded by another. That age drew upon great, exalted spiritual beings who served as the teachers and guides of humanity. Back then, in ancient times, when great holy leaders guided humanity, all these leaders were at least deeply imbued with the truths that the Theosophical Movement is now spreading among humanity—including the truth of the human soul incarnating again and again. If you consider the relationship between the great teachers of antiquity and the masses, you will gain an understanding of the nature of teaching in ancient times. Think back to those times and to the great, advanced individuals who looked into the mysterious, enigmatic structure of the universe, which was hidden from the eyes of others—as John expresses it in the Book of Revelation. They spoke to people who could not yet grasp these things with their intellect, but who had to be prepared so that they might comprehend them intellectually in later incarnations—in a figurative form. And this gave rise to the form of language spoken at that time: the language of legend, myth, and fairy tale.

[ 23 ] Here you sit today. But all your souls were once incarnated in those ancient times; all your souls listened intently to one of the great teachers of antiquity as he told the fairy tales. These fairy tales were not of the kind conceived from a light, superficial imagination like those of today; rather, the great truth of being lived and wove itself through these fairy tales. And even if the truth was not expressed conceptually within them, it was not the conceptual that sank into your souls along with the figures and characters of the fairy tale, but rather the feeling. The fairy tales you read in the Grimm collection largely contain such teachings of wisdom. As they were absorbed into human souls, you learned them in such a way that today you are able to grasp conceptually the truths that were once encapsulated in the fairy tales. It is the greatest falsehood to say that fairy tales contain no truths. They contain the most ancient truths of the human race. The soul that allows the fairy tale to flow into itself receives the seed of feeling for the truth, which later unfolds. In our youth, because everything in the world must repeat what existed in ancient times, we must briefly relive those souls and states of mind that we experienced in earlier times, when we heard the age-old words of humanity’s saints. And when a mother today tells her child a fairy tale from the treasure trove of ancient times, truth flows into the child’s soul. In this way, the child is repeatedly prepared for later life, when it will be able to grasp these truths with the intellect.

[ 24 ] When we look at things this way, we understand the course of history. We hear about the period we have described—from the time when the great mysteries of humanity were revealed all the way down to our own time. Our era was to become great through what human beings themselves are capable of bringing forth. Gradually, it had to develop out of what was wrapped up in fairy tales, just as a child develops into adulthood and independence.

[ 25 ] It was good that humanity turned its attention for a time to itself, to its own soul. That is an intermediate state. And what did it lead to? It led to what is expressed in the saying: We can know nothing about the afterlife. We know nothing about what first reveals itself beyond death. It is a great act of presumption to speak in this way. It is not those who know nothing about a matter who can speak of it, but those who do know something about it. Those who have truly understood the theosophical movement at its very core have also sought to grasp the truth through this very feeling. Inevitably, this self-centeredness has led humanity to a state of ignorance. At first, the human mind perceives only what lies on this side of death. Therefore, when looking inward, it can know nothing of what lies beyond death. But you will once again grow accustomed to listening to the teachers who have already crossed the threshold of death in this life and who can speak of this life from their own experience.

[ 26 ] What is happening there gives rise to a new sense of humility. It is not immodesty when those who speak on behalf of the Theosophical Society emphasize time and again: We do not speak from our own wisdom—no, we do not speak from our own wisdom—we speak of what the great leaders and sages of humanity continue to teach us even today. We do not speak of Masters because we presume to draw the higher truths from within ourselves, from our own source. We sit at the feet of the Masters because we know that as long as we rely on ourselves, as long as we do not make ourselves disciples of the Masters, we must remain at the stage of “I do not know.” Out of this humility, we do not express our own thoughts. I speak through what we wish to inspire in the world; I speak the wisdom of the great, wise guides who stand above us, having long since left our stage of development behind. And we try in every way to hear the voice of these Masters. That is why teachings such as those found in *Light on the Path* have been disseminated as the golden teachings of the Theosophical Movement. That sentence

Before the masters, the voice can speak; only through wounding must it unlearn this.

[ 27 ] becomes our guiding principle. We try to unlearn how to wound. We try to blunt the sharp edge of each of our thoughts that wounds, because we know that words that hurt others reflect back on the Master’s word. Sharp thoughts that hurt reflect back on the Master’s words. But when our heart opens like a bellflower, when our words are soft and gentle and do not wound, then the voice of the Master, the Master’s word, flows through us, pure and clear as a bell.

[ 28 ] You will hear the Master’s voice when you can pass through the words—which do not wound—without resistance. Then you will hear the Master’s words. The Masters’ thoughts flow through such thoughts. And when a person behaves in this way, the voice of the Masters resounds through him, through what he thinks and says. The “Masters of the Harmony of Thoughts and Feelings” become audible to him. It is in this sense that those who have a true relationship with the Master speak. Only in this sense may they and can they speak. Otherwise, their words are not truth, but deception and lies. Anything presented in a sense other than as a message from the Master is not true. It is true, however, that the thoughts and impulses of higher beings flow through the Theosophical Movement when we do not seek to spread our own thoughts but make ourselves instruments of those who wish to rekindle spiritual life in the world today.

From the Q&A section

Is it possible to practice listening to your inner voice while out in nature?

[ 29 ] The lesson of solitude in nature is very important. Most people cannot associate any true feeling with what has been called “silence in the forest.” And yet there is something very significant behind it. Imagine a very loud sound growing fainter and fainter, and then imagine it falling completely silent. Think of nothing else. Then you hear nothing around you. Imagine the same thing with light. You see light. The light grows dimmer and dimmer; then you see darkness. And yet, darkness is not nothingness. Darkness is just as positive a sensation as whiteness. But you see, the state of hearing nothing and seeing nothing arises from the gradual fading of light and sound. The complete darkness and silence have set in little by little. Now ask yourself: Couldn’t this gradual fading of sound continue even further? Down below this nuance, to a point where it is even quieter than when you hear nothing at all. In everyday life, everyone admits this. Someone who spends their money over and over again has nothing; but they can still have even less. They can go into debt. Then they have even less than nothing. As the tone goes deeper and deeper, you eventually reach a point where you hear the tone again on the other side of nature. But first you must learn to live the voice. In the beginning, this can be perceived as a mood. If you were to do such exercises, you would already discover that on the other side of the mental world, a new day is dawning for spiritual ears. Whoever can do this is on the right path. Much has been achieved thereby. In our cities, however, it is almost impossible. It is easy out in nature, where spring is truly green, where the trees, the leaves, and the forest look different every day. It is no coincidence that the occult sites where this culture was cultivated are situated out in nature.

Can plant colors be heard? I read a sentence by Stifter that went: “I heard the blue color of the flower.”

[ 30 ] To a limited degree of sensitivity, sounds also appear as colors, and not just colors as sounds. This goes even further: when another person utters “I,” certain individuals perceive a specific color in their consciousness. The opening of the Ninth Symphony has already been reworked in terms of color. The physiologist Nussbaumer has studied this phenomenon, as have French physiologists.

Do cities have certain colors, too?

[ 31 ] Yes, Berlin is gray, Vienna is red. The Gothic church is, on an astral level, a piece of music; on a mental level, a tonal structure.