The Rudolf Steiner Archive

3. The Paths and Goals of Spiritual Man I

[ 1 ] Over the course of these three days, we will address a specific “theme.” We will discuss the paths that the human soul can take in the present, as understood from the perspective of a spiritual-scientific worldview, and the goals of the theosophical life. Today’s lecture will serve as a kind of introduction to this. Tomorrow and the day after, we will then delve into the very heart of our consideration. Today, we will, so to speak, take a more external perspective and first ask ourselves the following questions: Is what we perceive as a spiritual-scientific worldview something that has been brought about by the whims of individual personalities, or is it rooted in the soul of the age itself? Are we dealing with something that is connected to the deepest needs of our era? — We come closest to answering these questions when we realize that all those who come to spiritual science from the most diverse walks of life—whether rich or poor, strong or weak—are seeking souls. They are all seeking souls who do not always know exactly what they are seeking, but feel that they are seeking something. They are often souls who have walked the most diverse paths and have allowed upon themselves the influence of what the present can offer. Souls who have sought to satisfy their longings in this or that field of art; souls who have looked around at what science can offer; souls who, after much laborious searching, have felt—more or less dimly, more or less clearly—that they cannot find in the present what corresponds to the soul’s search. Such souls are often touched by what the spiritual science movement has to offer, and say: Yes, here lives an impulse that is different from anywhere else, different from what comes from the life around me.

[ 2 ] What do such souls feel, or what might they feel, when they come into contact with what we might call theosophy today? We must not believe that these seeking souls, who find their way to spiritual science, are the only ones who seek. They are chosen, or they choose themselves from a great multitude of seeking souls. Anyone who listens to what is spoken from the deepest need of our time will see that there are many souls who say: We yearn for means to have the great mysteries of the world solved, and we cannot find that all that tradition has brought, all that modern science has to say, can solve these mysteries.

[ 3 ] Let us listen for a moment to what these souls—the best among them—have to say. They say something like this, and in these words, which flow from hundreds of thousands of such searching souls, we encounter something like the yearning heart of our time: We look back to distant times and see how, from century to century, from millennium to millennium, various conceptions of God and nature have followed one another, how they have succeeded one another and led to conflict between their proponents. Much has come down to us; millions of people profess such ideas, clinging to them with a sincere sense of truth, but just as many, out of that same sense of truth, can no longer profess what has been handed down, feeling compelled by their love of truth to let go of the old views.

[ 4 ] What was it like in ancient times? For example, people would look at the river flowing down from the heights to the plains, observe the beneficial effects of this river, and ask themselves: What is speaking to us through the roar of this river? What is it that works within this river? — And they found in it something they also found within themselves. They found that underlying it was a spiritual something, a divine being; they found in the flowing river a divine-spiritual power that rewarded, that provided humanity with what it needed for its well-being. In the blowing of the wind, in the rolling of the thunder, in the flashing of the lightning, they found a spiritual power similar to that which underlies the flow of the stream, the roar of the ocean surf. They saw in it something of which they said: Related to what lives in my soul is the murmur of the brook, the raging of the storm. Even if they speak differently, there is still something similar there, and I feel that I can understand it.

[ 5 ] Those to whom Moses brought down the tablets of the law felt something similar. They sensed that a being was speaking to them from them, infinitely greater than the head of a family, yet there was a kinship between what spoke from the thunder and what spoke from the venerable head of the family. They felt the Spirit deeply. They sensed a living bond between what lived within them as pain and joy, and the outside world. A bond that this man of ancient times could understand.

[ 6 ] This is how the best among us speak. And if you go where serious science speaks—not trivial superficiality—then you will hear the following: Our ancestors looked up to spiritual powers. They did not merely observe trickling water, blowing wind, or the fire of lightning. In these forces of nature, they saw spiritual beings: gnomes, undines, sylphs, and salamanders. Whatever we may think of these people, they found understanding among their contemporaries—those who wove their beliefs into the external world, drawing strength and steadfastness from them.

[ 7 ] And now the best of these searching souls add: We can no longer believe in gnomes, undines, sylphs, salamanders, or the spiritual beings of nature. For we have been taught that ironclad laws govern even the smallest atom. And we must conceive of the external world as a manifestation of these laws. We can no longer bring them to life as our ancestors did; we can no longer perform sacrificial ceremonies and ritual acts that send our voices upward; we can no longer say, when pain tears us apart: Take comfort, for life in the spiritual world will give you all the more comfort. — And a great many people say: Our whole world has changed. We no longer rely on what we once relied upon. If, for example, a rusty piece of iron had been driven into a person’s arm in the past, they would have sought comfort from spiritual beings. Today we do better to go to the doctor and use the means of external medicine. Thus we treat today what was once treated with what lives in the soul.

[ 8 ] The counterargument is: But we cannot exist without faith in a spirit; we cannot do without it. A spirit reigns in all laws, working in thunder as well as in the atom. — And one need only rise above the worst trivialities of materialism to be unable to close one’s mind to this insight. When the word “spirit” is uttered by such searching souls, what is meant by it? What is spirit? Where does it have its roots? How does a person come to form a conception of spirit?

[ 9 ] A strange idea is being spread today. In America, people speak of a new religion. This religion seeks to recognize only a God who works through the laws of nature, down to the atomic level. No one today can conceive of a God in human form—says the proponent of this doctrine—but we cannot do without the divine spirit. And so this figure arrives at a curious statement: The laws of chemistry are not enough. But where, then, is the substance for a conception of God to be found? — And so we hear the following: We must conceive of the Spirit that reigns in the laws of nature as being endowed with the noblest qualities of the human soul. — People are thus not prepared to imagine a God endowed with human qualities, yet they still wish to have something that gives substance to this idea of God.

[ 10 ] And here is the result: We have no choice; we cannot derive the content of our conception of God from anywhere other than from within human beings. — And the proponent of this worldview goes on to point out that in earlier times, divine beings were worshipped who served as inspirers, filling people with their power and urging them toward a task. Now, of course, we can no longer believe that there are supernatural beings who act as inspirers. The future, however, will revere advanced helpers, richer spirits who have something to give to the less fortunate.

[ 11 ] As you can see, feelings are still being placed in the place of what came before, feelings that cling to those who can offer comfort. After every earthquake, for example, there will be those who offer comfort to the many who have lost their loved ones. Human love will exist even when the supernatural helpers are no longer there.

[ 12 ] Don’t you notice that there is a strange contradiction here as well? We are told to look to those who offer comfort. But where do they find within their own souls what they need to be able to offer comfort and love? Thus, even among the best of people, we find that while they seek, their souls must feel confronted with a void.

[ 13 ] And what about science? Can we find comfort in what science has brought us? We want to fully acknowledge the beneficial effects of science, but there is one thing we must not forget. How much of the purely physical pain that humans have had to endure since ancient times has actually been alleviated? Humanity has certainly not become stronger or healthier since then. Certainly, there are many remedies that provide relief. But attention must be drawn to a contradiction here. External science believes that nothing can be lost. For example, when friction occurs, energy is converted into heat. What disappears reappears as a different form of energy. Anesthetics alleviate pain, and people speak as if the pain had vanished. Here lies a contradiction with that simple law. If the pain disappears, it reappears in another place. No matter how much we alleviate external pain, it transforms into spiritual pain. And people do not realize that this is connected to the alleviation of external pain. This does not prevent us from doing what our insight dictates to eliminate external pain, but we must learn to recognize these connections and not succumb to illusions in the spiritual realm.

[ 14 ] The searching souls have no idea that a person who is immersed in the outer world today—for example, in the rapidly developing fields of industry and technology—can easily be swept away by what presents itself to their eyes. But those who look more deeply know: this intoxication, this enthusiasm, comes at a price. — They know that souls are becoming ever more barren, ever less able to sense the answer to the riddles of existence. Certainly, we should bring into all spheres whatever can alleviate external suffering, but we must not forget that, even as we satisfy the physical body, we may cause the soul to starve more and more, inflicting ever greater suffering upon the soul through unfulfilled longing. This is the mood that overtakes those who not only look lovingly into the hustle and bustle of human life, but who also survey the course that the future is taking.

[ 15 ] Much is said about the goals that a person can set for themselves. In the frenzy that overtakes their soul when swept up in the whirlpool of modern external life, they fail to realize that this soul must remain a searching one. And why? Let us simply place before our souls the deepest foundation of all conflict in today’s sensibility. When we cut our finger and heal it using the best means at our disposal, we know: the same laws of nature govern it as they do the world around us. We are formed from the whole of nature, from the laws that reign around us. But at the same time, we feel the need to see something else within us. We see that spirit flashes from the human eye, that spirit speaks from the hand, that spirit resounds from the voice. And in recognizing this, we also feel ourselves to be bearers of the spirit. We do feel that we have emerged from the environment, but not solely from it. What governs this environment? Physical laws, chemical laws—what are known today as the iron laws of nature. That is not enough to explain the spirit. What physics, chemistry, and biology provide is not sufficient for this.

[ 16 ] Where does that which can be called the spirit have its roots? It is within us, yet homeless and rootless. We can understand the chemical composition of the blood, we can grasp precisely the metabolic process that takes place within us, and everything in the external world that is subject to physical and chemical laws. Yet as soon as we see external nature as devoid of spirit, everything is rootless. We cannot say: Just as blood is subject to the laws of blood circulation, so too does some spiritual entity follow the laws of the environment. No spirit can be found there, says the searching and erring soul of the present. From there, the answer to the questions that torment me cannot come to me. From where will it come to me?

[ 17 ] Now we see where the problem lies. We see that our conceptions of the external world are becoming ever clearer. But now the human being wants to take root in something with his spirit, with his soul. The soul cannot help but want this. It cannot flee from itself into a barren physical-chemical existence. This is where the conflict arises. The soul has a need to imagine a spiritual being, but nowhere in the external world can it find anything that corresponds to its present-day conceptions of a spiritual being. This gives rise to a profound untruth. Modern man cannot believe in sylphs, salamanders, undines, and gnomes. Yet that which could give him satisfaction does not exist. The soul stands there empty.

[ 18 ] The more deeply this is felt, the more untrue it becomes to speak only of the spirit. Either one finds the spirit, or one must artificially impose it. It may seem to some that what has just been said is too far removed from everyday experience. But everywhere we will find souls whose pain stems from this very reason. What spiritual science offers is intended to meet this great quest. Its aim is to build a bridge between the soul itself and that which lies outside, whether the soul is listening to the raging storm or watching the gentle movements of the ocean waves. Human beings are no longer able to idealize gods—who act behind air and water—based on human characteristics. We must refrain from seeing an anthropomorphic image of ourselves in what we call a divine being. That is the insight of our time. But the other aspect is the powerlessness of the seeking soul. On the one hand, it is said to them: If you want to find a God, you must not endow Him with human characteristics. On the other hand, the result is that we are unable to create a substitute for ourselves. Because these seeking souls lack something that would justify this fact, which arises as a matter of course, they stand there at a loss. Where will they find the firm ground that gives them security?

[ 19 ] This is only possible if human beings reclaim the right to explore the spiritual realm, if they look more deeply into their inner selves. People in the past were satisfied with less; people today are no longer satisfied with what came before. Spiritual science tells modern humanity: You have taken the wrong path. Are the qualities that humanity has discovered so far all there is? Are there not deeper foundations? Do we not find something hidden within that we can say: Yes, this could be related to what I perceive as the divine?

[ 20 ] There must be something more deeply rooted than anything humans have yet come to know about themselves, something that gives them the right to elevate human-psychological qualities to the divine. But how can one find the path to the depths hidden within oneself?

[ 21 ] Here, spiritual science points us toward paths that few people have taken in the past. Today, many people need guidance toward these paths. There are two paths: first, the path of mysticism, and second, the path of occultism in the true sense of the word.

[ 22 ] Let us consider these two paths. What is the path of mysticism? To understand this, we need only bring a certain moment to mind. You all know that in spiritual science we speak of how a person is not the same being in sleep as in wakefulness. When falling asleep, the inner being leaves the person, and upon waking, it descends again into the physical body and the etheric body. People generally do not notice that something special is happening in the process. Do we ever see from within what descends? A tremendous change then takes place within the human being. At the moment it descends, the human being does not see their etheric body and physical body from within. Otherwise, they would see that their physicality is illusion and maya. As ordinary human beings, we see the environment and that part of ourselves which we can observe from the outside. Human beings see nothing of what works and lives within them. They see only the exterior, which they also see in stones and minerals. For their gaze is diverted to the outer world as soon as they descend into their lower bodies. Those who have strived for a conscious awakening were the mystics. They experienced a conscious descent into the outer human being. All the images of inner life known to the mystics are what a person can see when they turn their gaze away from the outer world, from what otherwise captures their attention. The mystic experiences what a human being is when he looks at himself from within. There he sees, for example, not how the blood circulates, but that the blood is the bearer of divine activity; he sees that the blood is a shadow of spiritual reality. This is what the mystic experiences: the spiritual motor of his own being instead of the outer Maya.

[ 23 ] What the mystics tell us is true. Let us hear what they report: This descent is linked to what we call trials and temptations—the awakening of selfish impulses. Read the descriptions of what the soul is capable of unleashing in terms of base instincts. We must pass through a whole layer of passions, desires, and selfish impulses that we hardly thought ourselves capable of. All of this must be overcome if we wish to penetrate the deep layers of our own being. That our gaze is initially diverted from our own inner self is wisely arranged, for the human being is not yet ready to consciously descend into his own inner self. He must fight against everything that rebels within him once he has set out on the path of overcoming his own egoism. Only then does he find the true human being, who is concentrated in the smallest space, at the point of the self. Only then are we fully within ourselves, recognize ourselves in good and evil, and see what a human being truly is when he is beyond the layer formed by his instincts and desires, and when he has outgrown all that has been instilled in him through upbringing and convention. We must pass through this layer if we wish to penetrate our inner selves.

[ 24 ] There is yet another way to come to know the spirit and ourselves. It is not an easy path to take and is protected from the immature, because it, too, harbors its own dangers. In addition to the important moment of waking, there is also the moment of falling asleep, which is equally significant for the contemplation of the human being. Let us examine it more closely. At the moment of falling asleep, the human being passes into the spiritual world, into the world beyond physical reality. Their consciousness ceases; it fades away. The average person has no spiritual world around them in a conscious sense. If they were to enter the spiritual world while still immature, what would happen to them spiritually would be, in the most extreme sense, what in the physical world is being dazzled. They would be dazzled by the immediate sight of the spiritual that pours forth through the outer world.

[ 25 ] Once again, it is necessary to make the human being strong enough not to be blinded by this spirit poured out through the external world. This is achieved through the occult path. Through this path, they find their Self, not confined within their own innermost being, but poured out over the entire outer world, one with this outer world. This is the occult path.

[ 26 ] As a person learns to walk both paths—the path of mysticism and the occult path—a significant truth comes into view. Let him seek out the point where he is most compressed, most constricted within his own inner self, and let him pour out over the entire outer world; then he will ultimately experience the one Great, the Mighty. - What you experience when you descend into the depths of your own self and when you pour yourself out into the infinite is the same: mysticism and occultism, they go in opposite directions, and they lead to the same goal. Humanity discovers something that has lain dormant within them, something enchanted in the outer world, something that can be found in the deepest recesses of one’s own soul and out in the world of phenomena. They find that which lives as spirit behind the phenomena, and they find the spiritual within themselves when they have connected with the mystical path of knowledge and with the occult path of knowledge. This is then the bridge by which the abyss can be spanned that confronts the seeking soul of today when it realizes that it is something other than the world of external phenomena and cannot, with its own characteristics, connect with what surrounds it outside.

[ 27 ] Today, there is an opportunity to find a path that reveals how what lives within us is, in fact, the same as what lives in the outer world. The seeking souls who stand outside our endeavors do not yet know this path. Spiritual science points the way. The theosophical worldview aims to be a guidepost toward this goal. It will provide answers to the questions posed by the suffering, struggling souls of today. These questions will resound through the windows of the present, and spiritual science will provide the answers. This gives it its inner legitimacy and shows that it has not sprung arbitrarily from a few minds, but from the needs of the times. Spiritual science will once again indicate ways and means to find harmony between what lives in the environment and what lives in the human soul. It will lead us to recognize the laws governing nature not as empty abstractions, but as the thoughts of divine-spiritual beings. Thus it will rediscover the spirit in the outer world. The fact that the soul cannot do this today is what constitutes its emptiness and desolation. Comfort, help, and strength can come to it only through seeking out the paths and goals of the spiritual human being. This shows how deeply justified this spiritual scientific endeavor is.

[ 28 ] If we understand spiritual science at its deepest roots, we will provide the soul with the nourishment it craves, open up sources of spiritual activity for it, and—because everything external is an expression of the spiritual—ultimately bring about health as well. The longings and quests of our time define the goals of spiritual science.