The Rudolf Steiner Archive

4. The Paths and Goals of the Spiritual Man II

[ 1 ] When speaking of the paths and goals of the spiritual human being, one is repeatedly confronted with the question: Why should one even consider following such special paths? Why does Spiritual Science urge us to set such goals for ourselves? — The answer we must give must become a matter of intuition and feeling for us. It has been pointed out time and again that there are forces slumbering within the human being and in human nature that strive toward development and can be unfolded. Every human being has within them, besides the human being who sees and hears in the physical world, a higher human being. This higher human being exists in a germinal state, like a seed. Spiritual Science makes us increasingly aware of this. It is a human being about whom ordinary consciousness knows very little.

[ 2 ] We must clearly bring the following to mind: What we can currently perceive is our ordinary, everyday human being. But the one who slumbers within us—who is planted within us as a seed—is a spiritual human being. Whether this spiritual human being develops or not depends on our ordinary human being. We can use the powers of our ordinary human being to prepare the ground, but we can also leave it uncultivated and neglect it. In that case, we fail in our duty toward our spiritual human being. Through Spiritual Science itself—through what it can offer us in the form of teachings and insights—we can prepare the ground for this higher human being. If we transform this insight into feeling and emotion, it will provide us with the answer to the question: Is it not a form of higher self-interest to concern ourselves with ourselves in this way? — As long as we have not learned anything about Spiritual Science, it is our karma to wait. But once we have heard of the higher human being slumbering within us, it is our duty to do whatever can bring its powers to development so that we may better fulfill our tasks in the world. We cannot, therefore, speak here of selfishness, but only of an obligation toward our spiritual human being.

[ 3 ] This is the correct attitude of the theosophist toward external life. Theosophy provides us with a number of insights gained through spiritual research. However, this does not mean that everyone who wishes to live theosophy must be a spiritual researcher. The more we are able to walk the path of our inner development, the better. But before we ourselves achieve results in the field of spiritual research, we must have others explain its contents to us. If we have given this question sufficient thought over time, external life will confirm the findings of the spiritual researchers. Once we have grasped these findings through sound logic, we are given the opportunity to ascend to higher worlds. Reason and logic are the surest guides for this.

[ 4 ] The question may arise: How should we use this information? How should we relate to it? — Let us take the truth we call the law of karma. It states that in later earthly lives we encounter events that can be traced back to earlier incarnations. The more we apply such a law of spiritual research to life, the more we will see how true it is. Just as we never find a triangle in the sensory world whose angles do not add up to 180 degrees, so the circumstances of life must always confirm what is recognized as a law in spiritual research. And if karmic effects do not appear to us to be consistent, this will at most correspond to the slight deviation that may arise when measuring a circle with the aid of a planimeter. The result might be 361 degrees one time and 359 the next, but that does not negate the law itself. Nor is the law of gravity overturned simply because a jolt causes the plumb line of a falling-body machine to swing to one side. This merely proves that a different result is achieved when a new force comes into play.

[ 5 ] Spiritual research further shows how, in the course of life between birth and death, we encounter repetitions of previous periods of time. For example, what we acquire in early childhood—between the ages of three and seven—manifests in its karmic effects in our old age. If one examines how a person was allowed to spend their early childhood, one will discover a remarkable connection between their old age and those childhood years. If, instead of having been subject to the external constraints of certain rules, they developed healthy needs, their old age will take a different course. In many cases, however, people impose upon the child’s soul—cramming into it—what they consider to be right. Yet that is not what matters; rather, the child must feel the need to do this or that of its own free will. It then turns out that a person can maintain their health in old age and preserve their vitality and inner strength right up to the final stage of life.

[ 6 ] However, there are even more significant connections. From people’s writings, you can learn a great deal about how their past unfolded.

[ 7 ] Between the ages of seven and fourteen, it is essential that a person not be taught to use their reason prematurely. Authority must ensure that truth appears to us as such. If we are able to admire the people around us during this stage of life, this will serve us well in the penultimate stage of our lives. Contemplating the wonders of nature and cultivating a spirit of prayer are beneficial factors for the future. Joyful acceptance of authority returns, transformed in a way that makes it self-evident that such a person possesses authority. The devotion that children are capable of developing during this period results in them becoming people who, without doing anything, need only be in the company of others to have a blessing-like effect. The hand that could never be folded in devotion with another’s will never be able to bless. Whoever has never learned to bend the knees will never be able to bless. If you have thoroughly grasped such a law, you will find it confirmed. In this way, one can trace the effect of the law of karma even within the span of a single human lifetime. Thus, life provides us with evidence everywhere of a regularity at work in all areas.

[ 8 ] Of course, circumstances may arise that obscure the law. In physics, for example, we are familiar with the law of falling bodies. Let us imagine an object that, at any given moment, is moving through space without support, entirely on its own. As a result of the aforementioned law, this object will approach the Earth with increasing speed until it strikes the Earth. The object will move toward the center of the Earth according to very specific laws; it will fall. Let us further imagine that the falling object is suddenly struck by a horizontally directed force. The naive observer, who expects the object—falling vertically due to the law of gravity—to arrive at the relevant point on Earth, will wait in vain in this case. The object does not arrive. Does this mean that the law of falling objects has been suspended? Not at all. The horizontal impact has merely introduced a new force, and under its influence, the object now moves along a curved path that corresponds entirely in accordance with the laws of physics to the combined effect of gravity and the subsequently added force, toward the Earth. At the point where the object strikes the ground under these circumstances, its fall will be regarded by any observer as something entirely random and unpredictable. But this is not the case. The lawfulness of the process is complete and infallible.

[ 9 ] The same applies fully to the law of karma, although we can rarely trace it in all its complex and intricate effects. That is why human beings are always inclined to doubt their karma. But no matter how much external maya confuses us, we should let ourselves be guided only by what has become law within our soul. Many who wish to develop the spiritual powers within themselves will not find it easy, for physical life is always intruding. It takes only a minor obstacle in our existence for us to be easily carried away by misguided judgment—for example, into making insults—without thinking of the consequences of our actions. We strike a person and do not realize that we have raised our hand against ourselves, for that blow will strike us back in due time. The law of karma is at work everywhere. Everything that befalls us in life happens under the law of karma. But merely viewing this law as a doctrine, as a theory, does not yet make us theosophists.

[ 10 ] There are two attitudes we must adopt if we wish to work on our spiritual self. On the one hand, we must tell ourselves: Everything about us can be even more perfect; there is no limit to our ascent. — At every moment, the feeling of imperfection must spur us on to strive higher and higher up the ladder of perfection, which has no highest rung. We must keep this constantly before our minds; otherwise, we will not make any progress in our work on our spiritual self. On the other hand, we should tell ourselves: A second step is also necessary. — At every moment, we should feel that an infinite possibility for perfection lies within us. We should make our inner self as great as possible. This is an apparent contradiction, and we must perceive it as such. Development lies between these two points: the feeling of our own imperfection and the striving to make our inner self as great as possible.

[ 11 ] Anyone who strives to be a mystic, who delves into his own inner self, who seeks to advance through inner contemplation, must pass through the first stage. He must cultivate humility. The best rule a mystic can set for himself is this: to regard everything he encounters within himself as imperfect as possible, and to set aside his own personality entirely. For whoever delves into his own inner self must be prepared to experience terrible things. Stories of tragic experiences unfold in the inner world of the person who ventures into the depths of his own being. Tauler, Eckhart, and Paul can bear witness to this. And what help did they seek against these dangers? Paul says: “Not I, but Christ in me will act.” - Take the Master, the Ideal, with you, but at the same time realize that egotism must be driven out. Not everything should be felt, willed, and conceived by one’s own ego. One’s unworthy ego had to be driven out. This feeling is very similar to the sense of shame experienced by ordinary people. To want to be someone else, to want to incorporate another into one’s own soul—that is the path of mysticism.

[ 12 ] And what does the path of occultism entail? The path of the occultists leads into the outer world. If a person wishes to follow the occult path, he must live in such a way that he gradually learns to endure the higher world when he has stepped out of his body during sleep. He must cultivate a sense of perfecting himself in the infinite. But here, too, a danger awaits him, just as it does the mystic when he descends into his own inner self. We have already mentioned the dangers that befall the mystic; the mystic himself reports on them. Nothing is said about the paths of the occultist. Everyone must familiarize himself with this danger.

[ 13 ] When we look within ourselves, it would be terrible if we had not learned to perceive ourselves as a unity that permeates our entire being. This ability to hold fast to that unity is torn apart by every passion that overwhelms us. Anger, envy, and hatred destroy our ability to focus on that unity. And it is worst of all when we have not learned to concentrate, when we are driven here and there. We must learn to feel ourselves as a unity, steadfast and uninfluenced.

[ 14 ] But if, as occultists, we seek a path into the external world, we must set aside our personality, as it has just been characterized. Here, one must not seek a unity that underlies the entire external world. For when we turn toward the spiritual world, we encounter an infinite diversity of beings and relationships. If the occultist were to attempt to penetrate the oneness that lies behind the entire manifested world, he would perish. Imagine a drop of a red liquid, and imagine this drop being poured into a large basin of water. Being liquid, as the drop is, it would immediately dissolve into the mass of water; it would melt away. This is what happens to the ungrounded “I” when it seeks to enter the world of Oneness. We must not dare to attempt to penetrate there alone, for we would lose ourselves, just as the red drop loses itself in the mass of water. When we seek to enter the astral realm, we are directed toward multiplicity. In the face of this multiplicity, we must seek guidance from beings who stand higher than we do—from those who themselves have undergone a higher development step by step, from the hierarchies of that world. We must not try to skip anything, for it would be presumptuous to seek to advance directly to the Highest. We must learn step by step, with the help of the higher beings, if we are to comprehend Oneness. The arrogance of wanting to advance to the Supreme will surely lead to downfall. We must not allow our monotheistic mental images to mislead us into believing that, when the veil separating us from the spiritual world is drawn aside, we will see only a single divine Oneness. It is multiplicity that we behold, and it is upon this multiplicity that we must direct our gaze.

[ 15 ] But how are we to find our way? Pythagoras said: “Do not seek diversity with your eyes, ears, and senses; seek it through numbers!” — Armed with numbers, we are to approach diversity. Just as the mystic must imbue his inner being with the “ideal of higher perfection,” so must the occultist turn to numbers. And here one quality is absolutely essential: certainty. We must feel secure. For when a person wavers, what is he? A will-o’-the-wisp, a flickering light, and the world is a labyrinth. We need Ariadne’s thread to find our way back. Numbers anchor us; we must keep them in sight. — If you wish to enter the spiritual world, you must step outside yourself; you must first enter the chaos of multiplicity. — How do we find the factor? Where is the organizing principle? We find it through numbers, through the laws governing numbers. We must penetrate the essence of numbers and come to know their true value. Numbers alone can serve as our guide in the labyrinth. Numbers can teach us many things, and certain numbers are based on deep secrets.

[ 16 ] Let’s take the number two. Everything that comes into being reveals itself through the number two. Right cannot exist without left; light cannot exist without darkness. Everything that manifests outwardly is governed by the number two. The number two is the number of revelation, the number of manifestation.

[ 17 ] The number three is the number of the laws governing the soul: thinking, feeling, and willing. To the extent that something is organized and structured within the soul, it is subject to the number three. Where the number three reveals itself as a law, something spiritual underlies it. We can find the number three in countless contexts. In the three Logoi, we have the three fundamental forces that point back to something divine and spiritual.

[ 18 ] With regard to all temporal matters, the number seven applies: Saturn, the Sun, the Moon, Earth, Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan, which denote the seven successive stages of evolution.

[ 19 ] Wherever we see things working together simultaneously, we encounter the number twelve: the twelve gods, the twelve apostles, and so on. This is also connected to the reduction of the fixed stars to the twelve signs of the zodiac. The number twelve teaches us yet another law. Let us consider materialism. Is materialism wrong? It need not be, as long as one does not carry it into the realm of the soul. If one wishes to be a materialist, one must embrace vitalism; then one learns to understand material life. However, one must adopt a different perspective for the soul and for the spirit. If we wish to understand the world in its fullness, we must be able to take different standpoints. We must follow the practical spiritual path.

[ 20 ] One often hears people say: “You must develop a certain system if you want to penetrate the higher worlds.” — But that is the worst path one can take. Instead, one must first step outside one’s own personality—from the center that this personality occupies in one’s existence all the way to the horizon of our physical existence—and only here, at the horizon, should we take a specific standpoint, beginning with the materialistic one, and view it from within, from the single perspective through which, as already mentioned, we come to know material life. Only then can we walk around the horizon and choose twelve different viewpoints. This is the only path that can lead to true knowledge. The practical occultist must become very selfless before he can walk around the horizon in a circle. By having to forget his personal “I” twelve times, he attains unity both externally and internally.