The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Seventh Lecture

[ 1 ] On May 8—today—we, as the Theosophical Society, commemorate White Lotus Day, which the outer world, using its current terminology, refers to as the anniversary of the death of the founder of the spiritual movement to which we belong. We prefer to choose a different term for today’s celebration—one derived from our understanding of the spiritual world—which might be called the transition from one form of activity on the physical plane to another form of activity in the spiritual worlds. For it is indeed not only a most heartfelt conviction in the ordinary sense of the word, but an increasingly clear realization that what is called “death” in the outer world is, in fact, the transition from a form of work—an activity inspired by the impressions of the outer physical world—to a form of activity inspired directly by the spiritual world. And as we remember today the great inspirer A. P. Blavatsky and those leading figures who have already passed into this spiritual realm, let us, in particular, try to form a conception of how we ourselves should conduct our spiritual movement so that it may represent a continuation of the work that the founder accomplished on the physical plane until her departure from it—a continuation of this work on the one hand, but also a means by which this founder can continue to work from the spiritual worlds into our present and into the future.

[ 2 ] On a day like this, it is fitting that we, so to speak, take a break from the way we usually devote ourselves to spiritual scientific reflections and spiritual life in these gatherings, and that we, as it were, undertake a kind of examination of conscience—a kind of retrospective look at what the Theosophical Movement can reveal to us regarding its nature and its duties, and, on the other hand, a kind of preview of what this Theosophical Movement should be in the future, and what we ought to do and what we ought to avoid.

[ 3 ] Due to very special circumstances and certain historical necessities, what we refer to as the Theosophical Movement has come into being in recent times. You know that, unlike with some other spiritual or other movements or associations, this is not a matter of one or more individuals setting their sights on this or that ideal and, because they are inspired by these ideals precisely because of the state of their minds and hearts, they now try to inspire others as well, to found associations and societies, and to put into practice these ideals for which they are personally passionate. If we are to understand the Theosophical Movement correctly, we must not view it in this way. We will understand it correctly only if we view it as a historical necessity of our present life, as something that—regardless of how people may perceive or feel about it—was bound to come, because it lay, so to speak, in the womb of time and had to be born. How, then, can this Theosophical Movement be understood? It can be understood as a descent—a new descent—of spiritual life, spiritual wisdom, and spiritual powers from the supersensible worlds into the sensory-physical world. Such a descent of spiritual life, spiritual wisdom, and spiritual powers had to occur—and will have to occur again and again in the future—for the further development of humanity. Of course, it cannot be our task today to point out all the individual great impulses through which spiritual life has flowed down from the supersensible worlds in order to renew, so to speak, the aging soul life of humanity. This has happened frequently over the course of time. Only a few examples will be mentioned.

[ 4 ] In the distant past, not long after the great Atlantic catastrophe had struck—an event preserved in the traditions of various peoples as the legend of the Flood—that impulse took place which we may describe as the infusion of spiritual life into human development through the ancient holy Rishis. Then we have that other stream of spiritual life, which flows down into the course of human history through the great Zarathustra, or Zoroaster. Then we find another such stream of spiritual life in what came to the ancient Israelite people through the revelation of Moses. And finally, we have the greatest impulse—the most powerful inflow of supersensory life into the sensory world—through the appearance of Christ Jesus on Earth. This is the most powerful impulse in comparison to all of the past and, as we have also emphasized, in comparison to the entire future of Earth’s evolution. But it has also been emphasized that ever-new impulses must come, that new spiritual life and a new way of understanding the old spiritual life must flow into human evolution. For otherwise, the tree of human evolution—which must remain green if humanity is to reach its evolutionary goal—would wither and die. The mighty wave of Christ-life that has flowed into human development must be understood ever more deeply through new spiritual impulses that flow into our earthly life.

[ 5 ] As our era—the 19th century—approached, a time had once again come in human development that called for a new direction, a new impulse of life. Once again, new inspirations and new revelations had to flow down from the supersensible worlds into our sensory world. This was a necessity that should have been felt on Earth itself, but which was felt most keenly in those regions of the spiritual realm from which the guidance of all earthly life emanates. It would be nothing but short-sighted human thinking to say, for example: “Oh, why do we always need a fresh influx of entirely new kinds of truth? Why do we always need new insights and new life forces? What is given in Christianity, for example, is already there, and it could simply continue to live on in the same way!”

[ 6 ] From a higher perspective, this way of thinking would be eminently selfish. And indeed it is! And the fact that such a selfish way of thinking is so prevalent today, particularly among those who believe themselves to be truly devout and religious, is all the more proof that a renewal of spiritual life is needed. How often do we hear the saying today: “Why do we need these new spiritual movements? We have the old traditions—what has been handed down to us through the ages—let us not allow them to be corrupted by the ideas of those who always pretend to know everything better!” — That is a selfish expression of the human soul. But those who utter it do not realize that it is such an eminently selfish one. For those who utter it want, as it were, only to care for the needs of their own souls. They feel within themselves: “We are, after all, satisfied with what we have!” — And now they establish the dogma, that dreadful dogma of conscience: If we are content in our own way, then those who are to learn from us—our descendants—must be content in the same way as we are. Everything must go according to our heart’s desire, according to our knowledge! — That is a saying one hears very, very often in the outer world. And it is not merely narrowness of soul; it is something connected to what has just been characterized as a selfish trait of the human soul. And in religious life, under the mask of piety, souls may in fact be the most selfish of all.

[ 7 ] A look at our surroundings—if we wish to do so with understanding—could teach precisely those people who are serious about the spiritual development of humanity one thing: that the human soul is evolving, and that more and more of the way in which, for centuries, attention has been directed precisely toward the greatest impulse in human development—the Christ impulse—is crumbling away. I don’t usually like to mention contemporary matters, because what is happening today in external spiritual life is, for the most part, truly too insignificant to appeal to the serious observer on a deeper level. But for the observer of our times, what is happening in spiritual life today should nonetheless be a matter of conscience. In recent weeks, for example, in Berlin, one could hardly walk past a single poster column without finding an announcement for a lecture or a meeting on the topic: “Did Jesus Live?” You may all know that the impetus for this discussion—which has been conducted in the widest circles, in part with quite radical means—was provided by the views of a German professor of philosophy—a student of the author of The Philosophy of the Unconscious, Eduard von Hartmann—Professor Dr. Arthur Drews, and especially his book The Christ Myth. What is found in this book became further known through a lecture by Professor Drews, which was given here in Berlin under the title “Did Jesus Live?”

[ 8 ] Of course, it is not my task today to go into the details of Drews’s reflections. I simply wish to present a few main ideas for your consideration. The author of The Christ Myth—a modern philosopher who claims to embody the science and thought of our time—examines the individual historical documents from which one seeks to establish that a certain figure named Jesus of Nazareth lived at the beginning of the Christian era. And he attempts, based on what criticism and scholarship have established, to piece together something that leads him to ask: Are the individual Gospels historical documents from which one can prove that Jesus really lived? — And he now takes everything that modern theology has produced from this or that perspective and attempts to show that none of the Gospels can be a historical document, and that one cannot prove from the Gospels that Jesus lived. And there he attempts to show that all other accounts of a purely historical nature that people have are also inconclusive, so that one cannot infer a historical Jesus from them.

[ 9 ] Now, anyone familiar with the subject knows that, viewed purely from the outside, Professor Drews’s perspective certainly has much going for it and appears precisely as a kind of outcome of modern theological criticism. I do not wish to go into the details here. For the crucial point is that in our time, someone who believes he embodies scientific rigor from a philosophical perspective can assert: There are no historical documents from which one can prove that Jesus lived; the historical documents from which one seeks to prove this are all inconclusive. — What Drews and all who follow him rely on is what we have from the Apostle Paul. There are even some more recent scholars who doubt the authenticity of the entire collection of Paul’s epistles, but since the author of The Christ Myth does not go that far, we need not dwell on that either. Drews says the following about Paul: Paul did not proceed from any personal acquaintance with Jesus of Nazareth, but from what he experienced as a revelation during the event on the road to Damascus. — We know that this is absolutely true. But Drews then arrives at the following view. What kind of concept of Christ did Paul form? He formed the concept of a purely spiritual Christ who, so to speak, can dwell in every human soul and can gradually become a reality within every human soul. But for Paul, there was nowhere a necessity to have this Christ—whom he regards as a purely spiritual being—present in what would have been a Jesus who, after all, cannot be historically verified. Therefore, one could say: Whether or not a historical Jesus lived is unknown; Paul’s image of Christ is a purely spiritual one, a pure idea that merely reflects something that can live within every human soul as an impulse toward perfection, as a kind of God within man. - Now, the author of The Christ Myth further points out that certain conceptions, similar to those of the Christian Jesus Christ, already existed beforehand as a kind of pre-Christian Jesus, and he traces the concept of the Messiah among various Eastern peoples. This compels Drews to ask himself: How, then, does the idea of Christ—which, even from his perspective, cannot be denied that Paul held—how does this image of Christ in Paul’s mind and heart differ from what was already understood as the concept of the Messiah? And here Drews says: The people before Paul had an image of Christ as a god, an image of the Messiah as a god who had not truly become human, who had not descended to the level of individual humanity. In their various festivals, mysteries, and so on, they celebrated, so to speak, a symbolic process: suffering, death, and resurrection; but they did not have the concept of a single human being on the physical earth who had truly undergone suffering, death, and resurrection. So this was, as it were, a general idea. And now the author of The Christ Myth asks: What, then, is new in Paul? How did Paul himself develop the idea of Christ further?

[ 10 ] Here Drews himself says: “This is the progress Paul made compared to earlier times—that he did not merely imagine a general God hovering in the higher realms, but a God who had become an individual human being.” — So I ask you once again to pay attention: In the view of the author of The Christ Myth, Paul conceives of a Christ who has truly become an individual human being. But now comes the most peculiar part: Paul should have stopped at the idea alone—that is, Paul should have grasped the idea of a Christ who has truly become human, but this Christ as a human being should not have existed for Paul! Paul is supposed to have told himself: The highest idea is that a God, a Christ, does not merely hover in the higher realms, but that he has descended to earth and become human; however, he did not mean to say that this Christ actually lived on earth in a human being—that is to say: The author of The Christ Myth attributes to Paul a concept of Christ that is in itself a mockery of all sound thinking. Paul is said to have claimed: “Christ must truly have been an individual human being, but I deny—even as I preach him—that this Christ lived historically!”

[ 11 ] This is the crux of the matter at hand, which presents itself to us not as something that requires a great deal of theological-critical scholarship to refute, but rather as a point on which the author of The Christ Myth can certainly be engaged as a philosopher. For this concept of Christ—even when understood purely philosophically—is untenable. The Pauline concept of Christ, if taken solely in Drews’s sense, cannot stand at all without accepting the historical Jesus. Thus, this book actually demands, of Drews himself, the existence of a historical Jesus. It is thus possible today, even in the broadest circles, for a book to be regarded as a serious scholarly work when it contains at its core such a contradiction that it makes a mockery of all internal logic! It is possible that human thought takes such crooked paths today! Where does this come from? Anyone who wishes to gain clarity about the development of humanity should answer this question: Where does this come from?

[ 12 ] This is because, ultimately, it is not people’s logic that determines what they believe or think in this or that age, but rather their sensations and feelings—that is, what they wish to believe and think. And it is a fundamental trait of precisely those who are preparing the concept of Christ for the coming age that they wish to exclude from their hearts everything contained in external documents, yet at the same time feel the urge to prove everything through external documents. These documents, however, when viewed purely from a material standpoint, lose their value after a certain time. The time will come—just as it came for Homer and has already arrived for Shakespeare, and will come for Goethe—when people will attempt to prove that a historical Goethe never existed. Historical documents, viewed purely in material terms, must lose their value over time. What, then, is necessary, since we are already living in an age in which its finest representatives are capable of thinking in such a way that, out of an impulse of the heart, the goal arises to deny the historical Christ? What is necessary as a new direction in spiritual life? — What is necessary is the possibility of comprehending the historical Jesus in a spiritual way.

[ 13 ] What is another way to describe this fact?

[ 14 ] We all know that Paul’s journey began with the event in Damascus. And we also know that this was the great revelation for him, whereas everything he could hear in Jerusalem—as immediate news on the physical plane—was not sufficient to transform Saul into Paul. What convinced him was the revelation at Damascus, coming from the spiritual worlds. It was only through this that Christianity truly came into being, and from this Paul drew the strength to proclaim Christ. But did he derive from it merely an abstract idea that is inherently contradictory? No! Rather, from what he saw in the spiritual worlds, he gained the conviction that Christ lived on earth, suffered, died, and rose again. “If Christ had not risen, my teaching would be in vain!”—Paul spoke these words with good reason. From the spiritual worlds, he received not merely the idea of Christ, but the reality of the Christ who died on Golgotha. For him, this provided proof of the historical Jesus.

[ 15 ] If the time is now approaching when, due to the materialism of the age, historical documents lose their value and anyone can easily demonstrate that they have become so fragile in the face of criticism that nothing can be proven through external historical means, what is necessary then? Then people must learn to recognize that Christ, as the historical Jesus, can be recognized even without historical documents—through the fact that the Damascus experience can be renewed for every individual through spiritual training, or even, in the near future, for all of humanity—so that it becomes possible to gain a conviction regarding the historical Jesus. This is the new way that must come into the world: to find this path to the historical Jesus. For whether facts that have occurred are true or false is not what matters; what matters is that they exist. It does not matter that a book like The Christ Myth contains this or that error; what matters is that it could be written. This shows that we need entirely different methods so that the Christ may be preserved for humanity and rediscovered. Anyone who thinks of humanity and its needs, and of the way the human soul expresses itself, will not take the stance: “What business is it of mine what all those people who think differently think? I have my convictions; that is enough for me!”—Most people have no idea what a terrible form of selfishness lies precisely in that attitude.

[ 16 ] It was not merely some external idea, an external ideal, or a personal hobby that gave rise to a movement through which people were to learn that it is possible to find a path upward into the spiritual world, and that among what can be found there, Christ can also be found; rather, this movement arose out of necessity. This necessity arose in the course of the 19th century, and in response to it, possibilities were to flow down from the spiritual worlds into the physical world, enabling people to gain spiritual truth in a new way, because the old way had died out. And as we have seen over the course of this winter, how fruitful this path is proving to be!

[ 17 ] We have emphasized this time and again: The first thing we must do within our movement is not to rely on any charter or external document, but first to ask: What does clairvoyant consciousness reveal to us when we ascend into the spiritual worlds? What does independent spiritual consciousness tell us if, as a result of some catastrophe, all historical references to the historical Jesus, to the Gospels, and also to the Epistles of Paul were lost? What does the path—which can be taken every day and every hour—reveal about the spiritual worlds? It says: You will find the Christ in the spiritual worlds, even if you know nothing historically about the fact that the Christ was here on Earth at the time when our calendar began! This is the fact that can be established again and again through a renewal of the Damascus experience: There is original proof of the historical personality of Jesus of Nazareth! And just as a student is not merely told at the blackboard: “You must believe that the sum of the angles of a triangle is 180 degrees ‘because at some point in antiquity a person once determined that to be true’! — but just as we can prove to him today that the three angles of a triangle total 180 degrees, so too do we demonstrate today, from a spiritual perspective, that Christ has not only always been there, but that the historical Jesus can be found in the spiritual worlds, that he is a reality—and indeed a reality for the era that has been handed down to us.

[ 18 ] Then we continued and showed how what we had established through spiritual knowledge—without the Gospels—is reflected in the Gospels. And now we feel for the Gospels that high regard and esteem that cannot be surpassed by anything, because we find in them what we discovered independently of the Gospels in the spiritual worlds, and we now know: They must therefore have sprung from the same sources of supersensible enlightenment from which we draw today; they must be documents from the spiritual worlds.

[ 19 ] The very fact that such a perspective is possible at all—that spiritual life is thus finding its way into human scholarship—is the essence of what we call the Theosophical Movement. And in order for what had to happen to actually happen, the impetus had to be provided by the Theosophical Society. That is one side of the matter. The other side is that this impetus had to come precisely at a time when the world was least ready for it. This is evident from the fact that today, even though the Theosophical Movement has been in the world for thirty years, the refrain about the “unhistorical Jesus” and so on still persists. How many people outside our movement today realize that it is possible to discover the historical Jesus in a way entirely different from that provided by the external documents? People are continuing what they did in the 19th century: undermining the authority of religious documents. Thus, the necessity of presenting this new possibility to humanity was the greatest conceivable, while, on the other hand, people’s preparedness to receive these revelations was the least conceivable. Or do you perhaps believe that people—that today’s philosophers—were particularly ready for this? You can see how far philosophers have come at the beginning of the 20th century by the idea they have formed of the Christ of Paul. Anyone familiar with scientific life knows that, while this scientific life is indeed a high and ultimate consequence of what has been developing for centuries as materialism—and while it claims to want to go beyond materialism—the way of thinking that manifests itself in materialism is nothing more than something that is dying out. Science, as it exists today, is indeed a ripe fruit, but one that shares the fate of every ripe fruit: that it begins to wither. No one who understands this science can find in it the potential to produce a new impulse for the renewal of its mode of thinking and reasoning.

[ 20 ] If we consider this, then—leaving aside everything else—we will now understand the significance of the inspiration that came from H. P. Blavatsky, regardless of what we may think about the details of her life and her abilities. She was the instrument through which the inspiration was conveyed, and she proved, at any rate, to be a suitable instrument for that purpose. And as members of the Theosophical Movement, when we engage in such a celebration on a day like this, we find ourselves in a very special situation. We are celebrating a very personal festival that points to something personal. Now, the belief in authority is already a very dangerous thing in the outer world; but it is not as dangerous there because jealousy, envy, and so on play such a major role that, even when veneration of individual personalities manifests itself outwardly in quite intense adulation, selfishness and envy are still breathing down people’s necks. But in the Theosophical Movement, the danger of harm posed by any cult of personality and any belief in authority is extraordinarily great. Therefore, we find ourselves in a very special situation when we celebrate a festival dedicated to a personality. And we face a particular difficulty—not merely because of the customs of the times, but because of the nature of the matter itself—since revelations from the higher worlds must always take the detour through the personality. Personalities must be the vehicles for the revelations, and yet we must be careful not to confuse the personalities with the revelations. We must receive the revelations through the mediation of personalities. How natural is the question that arises time and again: Is the personality credible? What did she do on this or that day that does not fit our concepts at all! Can one therefore believe in this matter?

[ 21 ] This reflects a certain tendency of our time, which could be characterized as a certain lack of commitment to the truth. How often do we see today that people simply accept the work of a public figure—perhaps spanning decades—at face value: they like it just fine, and are too complacent to scrutinize anything. But when, perhaps decades later, it turns out that this public figure’s private life reveals this or that—something that might be used against them—then that public figure falls from grace. Whether this is justified or not is not at all the point; rather, the point is that we should develop a sense that, while the individual is indeed the channel through which spiritual life comes to us, we have an obligation to examine for ourselves—and specifically to test the individual against the truth, not the truth against the individual! We must always conduct ourselves in this way, especially toward the personalities in our Theosophical Movement. And, fundamentally speaking, we honor them best when we do not burden them with blind faith in authority—as people are so eager to do—for we know that the influence of a deceased personality is merely transferred to the spiritual world after death. It is justified to say: H. P. Blavatsky’s influence continues, and within the scope of what she inspired, we can either promote or hinder this influence. We hinder this influence most of all when we blindly believe Blavatsky, when we swear by what she thought while she walked on the physical plane, when we want to believe exactly as she may have believed, and when we approach her with blind deference. And we promote and honor her most of all when we are conscious that: She provided the impetus for a profound movement rooted in the necessity of humanity’s evolution. We attribute this merit to her and recognize that this movement was bound to come about. But years have passed since then, and we wish to prove ourselves worthy of this impetus by saying: What has been set in motion must be further developed. — We recognize: The impulse had to pass through this mind. We do not pry into H. P. Blavatsky’s private affairs, especially not today. We know what the impulse means, but we also know that the impulse can only represent what is to happen in the most imperfect way. And when we consider what has come before our souls this past winter, we must say: What H. P. Blavatsky inspired is indeed something profoundly significant; but what is there that Madame Blavatsky was unable to do through her first act? — What has only now, at this very hour, been proven: the necessity of the Theosophical Movement for the experience of Christ—this is something that was entirely beyond Blavatsky’s grasp. It fell to her to point out the core of truth in the religions of the Aryan peoples; yet she was completely unable to understand the revelations of the Old and New Testaments. We honor what she personally accomplished, and do not dwell on what she could not do, what was beyond her grasp, and what we must now add. Anyone who is inspired by H.P. Blavatsky and wishes to go further than she herself went will say to themselves: If the inspiration that H.P. Blavatsky provided is carried forward within the Theosophical Movement, then we will come to understand the Christ event.

[ 22 ] But that was precisely the shortcoming of the early Theosophical movement: it was unable to grasp the religious and spiritual life of the Old and New Testaments. Therefore, essentially everything contained in that initial inspiration regarding this subject is flawed. And the Theosophical Movement has the task of rectifying this and adding what was entirely absent from those initial impulses. When we feel this fact within ourselves today, it is at the same time a demand upon our Theosophical conscience.

[ 23 ] Thus, we see in H. P. Blavatsky the harbinger of a kind of dawn of a new light. But what good would this light be if it did not seek to illuminate the very most important thing humanity has ever had? A theosophy that lacks the means to comprehend Christianity is absolutely worthless to contemporary culture. But if it is indeed the instrument for comprehending Christianity, then we must use that instrument in the proper way. What, then, are we doing if we fail to do what has just been described—if we do not use H. P. Blavatsky’s inspiration to understand Christianity? Then we are hindering the effectiveness of Blavatsky’s spirit in our time! Everything is, after all, in a state of evolution—including the spirit of Blavatsky. And this spirit is at work today in the spiritual world, ensuring that the Theosophical Movement moves forward. But if we stand before H. P. Blavatsky with the books she has written and say: “With your own works, we are erecting a mound for you!” ‘You must remain with what you did in your physical life!’—who, then, is it who makes Blavatsky’s spirit earthbound, condemning it so that it cannot move beyond what it has established on Earth? It would be us! But by moving beyond her—just as she moved beyond what came before her—we honor and acknowledge H. P. Blavatsky, as long as the grace of the world’s evolution can continue to grant us spiritual revelations from the spiritual world.

[ 24 ] Let us consider this today as a matter of conscience, for this is, after all, most in line with the views of that contemporary of ours who has now passed into the spiritual world, H. S. Olcott, the first president of the Theosophical Society. Let us take this to heart in a very special way today! For it is precisely through a lack of understanding of the living theosophical life that all the dark sides of the Theosophical Movement have arisen: If the Theosophical Movement were to continue its original great impulses with a clear conscience and without weakening, it would, through its own power, be able to easily overcome everything—all the corrupting influences that have already arisen over time and that will certainly arise in the future. But this is precisely what we must do in earnest: keep these impulses alive and developing. Today, however, we see in many places where Theosophists believe they are making an impact that they feel particularly comfortable saying: “We are now doing something that is also confirmed by external science!” — How much some leading Theosophists love it when they can point out how scholars of religion also confirm what has come from the spiritual world, and they pay no attention at all to the fact that it is precisely this unspiritual method of comparing religious texts that should be overcome. For example, Theosophy even comes into sharp conflict with what was on the wane and led to the denial of the historical Jesus, and there is even a certain kinship with these ideas. Originally, Theosophy accepted the historical Jesus just as it did the other founders of religions. It did not occur to Blavatsky to deny the historical Jesus. She did, admittedly, push him back a hundred years in time—which is, however, an error—so she did not deny him, but she also failed to recognize the essence of Christ Jesus. Although she provided the impetus for the movement she initiated to one day recognize the essence of Christ, she herself was unable to do so. In this respect, the early phase of the Theosophical Movement bears a most curious resemblance to what the deniers of the historical Jesus are doing today.

[ 25 ] For example, Professor Drews points out today that the events leading up to the crucifixion on Golgotha can also be found in ancient myths, such as in the cults of Adonis or Tammuz. There we see a suffering divine hero, a dying divine hero, a resurrected divine hero, and so on. People always compare religious traditions from one place to another and then conclude: You are told of a suffering, dying, and resurrected Jesus of Nazareth, who was the Christ, but you see that other peoples also celebrated this in Adonis, Tammuz, and so on. Everywhere, reference is made to the similarity of this or that ancient divine figure to what is described in the events in Palestine.

[ 26 ] This has, to a large extent, essentially been practiced within the Theosophical Movement as well. When comparing religions today, people fail to realize that comparing Adonis or Tammuz with the events in Palestine tells us absolutely nothing. I simply want to use a comparison to illustrate to you where the error in such a comparison of religions lies. Outwardly, it may be entirely correct, yet it is still subject to a tremendous error. Suppose there is a uniform worn by some civil servant who, let’s say, lived in the year 1910. The uniform that this civil servant wears in 1910 simultaneously represents the outward nature of his work, of his office. And let us further suppose that in the year 1930, another person—who is completely different—wore the same uniform. But it is not the uniform that matters—it is the individuality—in how a person performs their work. Now, however, let’s imagine that in the year 2090, a historian were to come along and say something like this: “It is reported that in the year 1910 there was a person who wore this jacket, these trousers, and this vest.” But in 1930, I also see the same coat, the same vest, and the same trousers—so we see that the coat, trousers, and vest have been passed down, and that in both cases we are actually looking at the same person!

[ 27 ] Such a conclusion is, of course, foolish. But it is no wiser to say: Let us look at the Near Eastern religions and see how suffering, death, and resurrection are depicted in Adonis or Tammuz; we find the same thing in Christ as well! — But what matters is not that suffering, death, and resurrection are depicted, but rather who it is who has risen! Suffering, death, and resurrection are the common thread running through the development of world history, and we must not point to this common thread as it appears in legends, but rather to the individualities that lie within them. Certainly, in order for people to understand them, these individualities have revealed themselves in the same way; they have, so to speak, performed “Christ-like deeds” intended to show that He, too, can perform the deeds that, for example, a Tammuz once did. — But there was always a different being behind these deeds. Therefore, any comparison of religions—such as the claim that the figure of Siegfried corresponds to the figure of Baldur, the figure of Baldur to that of Tammuz, and so on—is merely a sign that certain forms of legends and myths occur among these and those peoples. This is no more meaningful than if, in order to get to know people, one were to point out how a certain type of uniform is found in a particular office. This is the fundamental error that is rampant everywhere—and which, for example, can also be rampant in the Theosophical Movement—and which is nothing other than a consequence of materialistic habits of thought.

[ 28 ] Blavatsky’s testament will be fulfilled only if the Theosophical Movement is capable of nurturing and preserving the life of the Spirit within itself, if attention is focused on the Spirit, which reveals itself continually not through books written by anyone, but through living reality. We must nurture the Spirit among us. We do not want merely to study books written centuries ago, but to actively develop what has been given to us as Spirit. And we want to be something like a union of people who do not merely believe in books and people, but in the living Spirit, and who do not merely speak of the fact that H. P. Blavatsky has departed from the physical plane and continues to live after her death, but who believe so vividly in what has been revealed through Theosophy that they themselves, through their own being on the physical plane, cannot be an obstacle to the supersensory continued working of Blavatsky’s Spirit. Only then will we mean something to the Theosophical Movement if we think this way about H. P. Blavatsky, and only then will H. P. Blavatsky be able to mean something to the Theosophical Movement if there are people on earth who can think this way. But for this to happen, it is necessary to continue spiritual research and, above all, to believe in what was mentioned especially in the last public lecture: that humanity is in the process of progress, and that something such as conscience truly entered history at the time of Jesus Christ, and that such things arise and have significance for the entire process of development. Conscience is something that emerged at a specific point in time. Conscience used to be something else, and it will become something else again once human souls have developed for a while in the light of conscience. We have already pointed out how conscience will change in the future.

[ 29 ] Parallel to the occurrence of the Damascus event among a large number of people throughout the 20th century will be a process whereby people will learn, whenever they have committed any act in life, to look back on that act. They will become more thoughtful and will have an inner image of the deed—at first only a few, then more and more over the course of the next two to three millennia. After people have done something, the image will be there. At first, they will not know what it is. But those who have become acquainted with spiritual science will say to themselves: Here I have an image! This is no dream, not a dream at all; it is an image showing me the karmic fulfillment of the deed I have just done. This will one day occur as fulfillment, as karmic compensation for what I have just done! — This will begin in the 20th century. Then the ability will develop in human beings to have an image of a very distant deed that has not yet taken place. This will manifest as an inner counter-image of their action, as the karmic fulfillment that will one day come to pass. People will then say to themselves: “Now I have done this. Now I am being shown what I must do to bring about balance, and what would always hold me back from perfection if I did not achieve that balance.” — Then karma will no longer be a mere theory, but this characterized inner image will be experienced.

[ 30 ] Such abilities gradually become more and more apparent. New abilities develop, but the old abilities are the seeds for the new ones. What, then, will cause the karmic image to manifest in people? It will be because the soul has stood for a certain time in the light of conscience! That is, after all, what is important for the soul: not that this or that external physical experience is undergone, but that the soul thereby becomes more perfect. Through conscience, the soul prepares itself for what has now been described. And the more people have gone through incarnations in which they have particularly developed their conscience, the more they will nurture this conscience within themselves, the more they will strive to attain that higher capacity which, in spiritual vision, once again reveals to them the very voice of God that people once had in a different way. Aeschylus portrayed an Orestes who still had before him the consequences of his terrible deeds. Orestes must still witness how the effects of his actions are manifested in the outer world. The new ability developing within the soul is one through which human beings will see, in images, the future consequences of their actions. That is what is new. Development always proceeds cyclically, always in a circular pattern, and what humanity once possessed in the old way of seeing will reemerge in a renewed form.

[ 31 ] In this way, through the insights of the spiritual world, we prepare ourselves to truly awaken in the right way in our next incarnation, and in doing so, we also work to ensure that our descendants are cared for to the appropriate extent. Thus, spiritual research is, at its very core, a selfless endeavor, because it does not ask what benefits the individual, but rather what brings about the progress of all humanity.

[ 32 ] We have now asked twice: What is conscience? Now we have also asked: What will become of the conscience that is developing today? How does conscience present itself when we view it as a seed in the era that humanity is currently experiencing? What will become of what conscience brings about as a seed? — These characterized higher faculties will emerge from it! This is the crucial point: that we believe in the evolution of the soul from incarnation to incarnation, from age to age. We learn this by coming to understand true Christianity. And in this regard, we still have a great deal to learn from Paul. Look at all the Eastern religions, including Buddhism, and you will find the teaching: The outer world is Maya. — Certainly it is, but in the East this is presented as an absolute truth. Paul also knows this truth; indeed, he emphasizes it sufficiently. But Paul emphasizes something else as well, namely this: True, a person does not see the truth when he looks out with his eyes; he does not see reality when he looks at what is outside. Why not? Because in descending into matter, he himself has transformed external reality into an illusion! It is man himself who, through his own actions, has turned the external world into an illusion! Call it, as the Bible does, the “Fall” or whatever else you like—it is what causes the external world to now appear to him as an illusion. Eastern religious teachings blame the “gods” for the fact that the world appears to man as Maya. “Beat your own breast!”—as Paul says—“you have descended and have clouded your own perception to such an extent that color and sound do not truly appear as spiritual realities. Do you believe that color and sound are something that exists materially in and of themselves?” It is Maya! You yourself have turned it into Maya. You, human being, must redeem yourself from it. You must reclaim what you have forfeited! You have descended into matter, and now you must redeem yourself from it, free yourself from it—but not in the way Buddha says: “Conquer the urge to exist!” No! You must see the reality of earthly existence as it truly is. What you yourself have turned into Maya, you must set right again within yourself. And you can do this by absorbing the Christ-force within you, which reveals the outer world to you in its true reality!

[ 33 ] Herein lies a great impetus for Western life, a new trend, and it is still far from being fully realized in the various fields. What does the world know today about the fact that, in one field, an attempt has even been made—in the spirit of Paul, so to speak—to create a theory of knowledge? Such a theory of knowledge could not say, in the Kantian sense, “The thing-in-itself is something incomprehensible”—but it could only say: “It is up to you, human being; through what you are now, you bring about a false reality. You must undergo an inner process yourself. Then Maya will be transformed for you into truth, into spiritual reality!” — To establish a theory of knowledge on a Pauline basis in this sense was the task of my two works, Truth and Science and The Philosophy of Freedom. These two books engage with what constitutes the great achievement of the Pauline conception of the human being in the Western world. That is why these books have been so little understood—except perhaps in a few circles—because they presuppose precisely the very impulses that have found expression in the movement for spiritual science. The greatest must reveal itself in the smallest!

[ 34 ] Through such reflections, which lift us above our narrow humanity and show us how, in our small, everyday work, we can build upon what leads us, step by step, life by life, ever deeper into spiritual existence—through such reflections we become true Theosophists. And we may especially devote ourselves to such contemplation on a day dedicated to a figure who inspired a movement that will live on farther and farther, a movement that is not meant to remain a dry theory for any one person, but is meant to possess the sap of life within it, so that the tree we call the tree of the theosophical worldview may ever be renewed.

[ 35 ] In this spirit, let us strive to prepare a foundation within our movement that does not hinder or hold back Blavatsky’s impulses, but rather fosters their ever-greater development.