The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Ninth Lecture

[ 1 ] We have seen how, in our present era, what will later manifest in a person’s outward appearance can be inscribed in the soul. Just as seven successive cultural epochs can be identified in our own time, so too do the seven periods of human development following the war of all against all present themselves to the apocalyptic seer who looks into the future; he sees these seven periods in the seven seals. However, he makes a sharp distinction between the periods he identifies as the first four. Each time he breaks one of the seals, one of the four horses appears to him, with a rider upon it.

[ 2 ] The apocalyptic writer is thus concerned with the clairvoyant vision of the seven future eras. These are astral images of what will one day be. Those who have absorbed something of the spiritual culture will have overcome their lower nature; they will then have mastered human instinctive nature. That which the human being has overcome is expressed in the seal in the form of a horse. Through what he will have made of his soul, he will be victorious over his lower nature; he will master it, just as the rider is the master of the horse.

[ 3 ] Everything that has been experienced in our era since the ancient Indian period reappears after the war of all against all. Thus, in this repetition, the ancient Indian period reappears first. At that time, everything in the physical world was an illusion, Maya, to human beings; at that time, the soul had matured to the point of triumphing over everything in the sensory world. To the apocalyptic thinker, the fruit of this Indian era appears in the image of the white horse. It is characteristic of this human soul that the external world—material culture—still seems untouched by human hands; innocent as the bright sunlight is the rider with his bow. Like a victor, he has earned the right, after the war of all against all, to triumph over the lower nature. But this lower nature is still there; humanity has become so intertwined with it, as depicted in the second seal as a red horse. Here, the soul is no longer clothed in white innocence. Consequently, during this period, humanity cannot appear as the victorious rider; rather, it appears to us as one who brings the fruits of selfishness. After the war of all against all, it no longer appears in white; instead, it once again takes peace from the earth, and once again it shows itself in the struggle for existence with the sword.

[ 4 ] Now we see the fruit of the third epoch, the Egyptian-Chaldean culture, in which humanity learned arithmetic and counting. Humanity has descended deeper and deeper into matter, into the darkness of the lower nature; this is symbolized by the black horse and the rider with the scales. Weighing, measuring, and counting—to the apocalyptic thinker, these are expressed as a black horse, and the human soul as the rider with the scales. In Persian culture, there were not yet such social institutions through which human beings allocated property according to intelligent, state-social orders; such a thing existed neither in ancient India nor in ancient Persia. In ancient India, people still believed in their Atlantean incarnations. In ancient Indian times, people viewed their station in life as a consequence of what they had brought upon themselves in ancient Atlantis. They told themselves that they belonged to a certain caste as a result of humanity’s karma; they looked up to the higher castes as a just division based on individual karma. This division into castes, however, became increasingly impossible due to the development of the human ego. The period in which the distribution of property and wealth began to be calculated primarily by intelligence was the Egyptian-Chaldean era. The fruit of this third period thus appears as the rider sitting on the black horse, holding the scales with which all thought and human intelligence are weighed. Thus, the apocalyptic visionary sees symbolically what will appear as the fruits of our seven cultures after the war of all against all.

[ 5 ] The fourth historical period—Greco-Roman culture—conquered the beauty of the physical world. The Greeks idealized nature in their art; they embellished existence. How beautiful Greek sculpture and architecture appear to us in contrast to Egyptian art, the Sphinx, and the pyramids. But the Greeks had come to love physical, sensory existence so dearly that the spiritual world had become obscure to them, and light only penetrated once more into what was, for them, utter darkness through the event at Golgotha. The soul had been completely bound in chains during this fourth epoch. The lower nature, however, experienced a beautification during this epoch; it was, as it were, clothed in a mantle of beauty and art. This is truly the defining characteristic of the soul in this epoch, which is the most beautiful for the earthly realm; but for the soul itself, the fruit of this epoch is tantamount to death. The souls will reap the least benefit from this epoch, which has granted them dominion over external physical nature.

[ 6 ] And now we come to the fifth period, when the Yahweh-Christ principle shines upon the souls even between death and a new birth. There, the souls become ever more alive. What happens in this fifth period? The astral body becomes ever more radiant and luminous through what the soul absorbs from the Christ impulse. Let us imagine, as seen clairvoyantly, the astral body radiated by the “I”; according to the apocalyptic writer, after the war of all against all, it appears as a white robe. Thus, in the fifth period following this war, the soul will appear permeated by the aura that is already illuminated by the Christ-light... [gap]

[ 7 ] Those, however, who embraced the Christ principle even in the earliest days of Christianity suffered greatly in terms of outward, physical martyrdom. But things are coming to a head in this fifth period. Through the Rosicrucian-theosophical spiritual current, the Christ impulse will be received by an ever more selfless self and with living understanding, and its followers will develop toward an ever higher spiritual life.

[ 8 ] But another current, acting as a sharply oppositional force, works toward a certain cultivation of the ego in order to drive this ego ever deeper into materialism, so that materialism ultimately triumphs over the personality. All external, practical life detaches itself from the individual and becomes materialized—for example, through the actions of corporate capital, which is increasingly detaching itself from the personality. Human beings will increasingly be overcome in their personal capabilities. The stock is the path to the materialization of this branch of practical human participation.

[ 9 ] Thus we see materialism gaining the upper hand more and more; the trend will increasingly be such that the spiritualization of the human personality must serve as a counterpoint to this ever-increasing materialism. That which stands in sharp opposition to this will, at the end of our era, appear as humanity that has been outwardly overcome. And the people who were put to death for the sake of the Word will have much to suffer; but they will be precisely the most important bearers of culture as we move beyond the war of all against all.

[ 10 ] And a sixth era begins with the church in Philadelphia. Apart from these spiritual people, the rest of humanity is completely entangled in social life, lost in an ever-increasing materialism. But these people will master the forces of nature to a great extent, as we already see today in wireless telegraphy and aviation. It is not a matter of indifference whether the airspace is filled with spiritual thoughts or with thoughts of material needs. This will encompass our entire globe. Here we are looking into an era in which humankind will intervene to a great extent in the realm of air and light.

[ 11 ] What will be the fruits of this period? In reality, it appears that for a certain period of time, these electrical waves will have a reciprocal effect on the forces of the Earth, and depending on whether humanity’s actions are good or evil, earthquakes and tremors will occur as a result. “And I saw when the sixth seal was opened, and there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair.” (Rev. 6:12) By transmitting his feelings into the air, man alters all of nature, and something like a meteor shower occurs. Thus, man unleashes the forces of nature, but his actions do not go unpunished.

[ 12 ] As we observe this, it also strikes us that humanity will meet its downfall amid these unbridled forces of nature. But those who unite themselves with the spirit appear as the “sealed ones.” Such people must take into themselves whatever spiritual teachings can reach humanity.

[ 13 ] What people take in as spiritual content will in the future be the lifeblood of their spirit and soul; it will be the light that radiates from them as spirit. Humanity stands firmly on the Atlantic and post-Atlantic cultures as if on two feet, on the water and on the earth. But they must take wisdom into themselves like a book that one devours. This figure points upward into the spiritual world; it gives the apocalyptic writer the book; he is to devour it—it is to be indigestible for the lower human nature, but sweet as honey for the higher, in that one does not read the book but devours it. The person who, through modern, logical thinking and occult training has developed clairvoyant abilities and can relive what the Apocalyptic writer recorded, sees the Apocalyptic writer’s visions in the Rosicrucian seals. The seal with the two pillars represents the tenth chapter of the Apocalypse.