The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Christ and the Human Soul I

[ 1 ] My friends from Norrköping have asked that, on this occasion—at the beginning of which I warmly greet you, my dear friends—I speak on a topic related to that Being who, in the field of Spiritual Science, is closest to us and touches us most deeply: the Being of Christ. And I have sought to fulfill this request by resolving to speak about the revival and the significance of this revival of the Christ-being within the human soul. It is precisely through this topic that we will have the opportunity to speak, from the perspective of Spiritual Science, about the most human, the most heartfelt significance of Christianity.

[ 2 ] This human soul! In Spiritual Science terms, we have a short word which, while not encompassing everything that the human soul means to us, nevertheless points to that which, in a sense, fills and permeates the soul within its broadest limits for us earthlings—we have the short word “I.” Our “I”-being extends, insofar as we are earthly human beings, as far as our soul life. When we now utter the name of the “I”-being, we immediately recall that with this “I”-being we are designating one of the four aspects of human being that are closest to us. We speak of four members of the human being in the first instance: the physical body, the etheric body, the astral body, and the “I.” And we need only recall a few things to gain starting points for the consideration we wish to undertake in these days. We need only recall that we do not view the human physical body as though its laws—the essential nature it contains—were to be recognized by us from what our earthly environment initially presents. We know that if we wish to understand the human physical body, we must go back to the three preceding incarnations of our Earth: the Saturn, Sun, and Moon incarnations; we know that in the distant past, during the Saturn incarnation of our Earth, the physical body had already acquired its predisposition; we know, then, that during the Sun incarnation the etheric body acquired its predisposition, and during the Moon incarnation the astral body. And what, in essence, is our Earth’s development other than, in all its phases, in all its epochs, that which gives the I the possibility of realizing itself in all its expanses!

[ 3 ] We can say: Just as the physical body had reached a certain stage of development that was significant for it at the end of the Saturn period, just as the etheric body had likewise reached a stage that was significant for it at the end of the Sun period, and the astral body likewise at the end of the Moon period, so our ego will have reached a significant point in its development at the end of the Earth period. And we speak of our ego developing through three soul members: the feeling soul, the intellectual or emotional soul, and the conscious soul. All the worlds encompassed by these three soul members also have something to do with our ego. It is these three soul members that, in the course of our Earth evolution, first prepared the three outer physical members—the physical body, the etheric body, and the astral body—over long Earth ages, and which now, in successive cultural epochs of the post-Atlantean era, continue to develop in a certain way; in future earthly epochs, they will once again adapt to the astral body, the etheric body, and the physical body, so that the Earth may prepare itself to transition toward the Jupiter stage of development.

[ 4 ] If we take the term broadly enough, we could even call the human being’s earthly development his soul development. One could say: When the Earth began, the soul began to stir within the human being in accordance with natural laws. It first worked on the outer sheaths, then worked its way out, and is now preparing to work on the outer sheaths once more, so that the development of Jupiter may be prepared. Now we must keep in mind what the human being is to become in his soul during the development of the Earth. He is to become what one might describe with the term “personality.” This personality requires, first of all, what can be called free will; but on the other hand, it also requires the ability to find within itself the path to the Divine in the world. Free will on the one hand—the ability to choose between good and evil, between the beautiful and the ugly, the true and the false—this free will on the one hand, and the apprehension of the Divine in such a way that it penetrates our soul and we feel inwardly fulfilled, freely fulfilled with the Divine on the other hand—these are the two goals of the human soul’s development on Earth.

[ 5 ] This development of the human soul on Earth has, one might say, received two religious gifts aimed at these two goals. One religious gift is intended to instill in the human soul the powers that lead to freedom, to the ability to distinguish between true and false, beautiful and ugly, good and evil. And on the other hand, another religious gift has been bestowed upon humanity during its earthly development to implant in the soul that seed through which the soul can feel united with the divine within itself.

[ 6 ] The first religious gift is what confronts us at the beginning of the Old Testament in the form of the magnificent image of the Fall, of temptation. The second religious gift is what confronts us in all that we encompass with the term “Mystery of Golgotha.”

[ 7 ] Just as the Fall and temptation have to do with what was planted within human beings—freedom, the ability to distinguish between good and evil, beautiful and ugly, true and false—so the Mystery of Golgotha has to do with the human soul being able to find its way back to the Divine, so that it may know: the Divine can shine within it, that the Divine can permeate it. In a sense, these two religious gifts encompass the most essential aspects of Earth’s evolution—all that within Earth’s evolution which pertains to what the soul can experience in its deepest depths, and which is most intimately connected to the nature and development of the human soul.

[ 8 ] To what extent are the concepts associated with these two religious gifts connected to the nature and development of the human soul, and to the inner experiences of the human soul?

[ 9 ] Well, I don’t want to simply describe what I have to say in abstract terms; I would like to begin with a very concrete observation. I would like to begin with how a certain scene from the Mystery of Golgotha appears before us in historical tradition, just as it has been imprinted—and should be imprinted even more deeply—in the hearts and souls of human beings. Let us assume for a moment that we have before us in Christ Jesus the very being whom we have frequently discussed and characterized in the course of our Spiritual Science reflections; let us assume that in Christ Jesus we have before our spiritual eye the mental image of that which must appear to us human beings as the most important thing in the entire universe. And then let us set against this feeling, this emotion, the screaming, the raging of the agitated crowd in Jerusalem before the crucifixion, at the time of the condemnation. Let us picture in our mind’s eye the fact that the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem considers it of the utmost importance, above all else, to ask Christ Jesus how he stands regarding the Divine, whether he confesses himself to be the Son of the Divine. And let us grasp in our mind’s eye that the Sanhedrin regards this as the greatest blasphemy that Christ Jesus could have uttered. Let us further keep in mind that we are faced with a historical scene in which the people are shouting and raging for the death of Christ Jesus. And let us now try to bring to mind what this shouting and raging of the people actually means historically. Let us ask ourselves: What, then, should this people have recognized in Christ Jesus?

[ 10 ] They should have recognized in Christ Jesus the Being who gives meaning and significance to earthly life. They should have recognized in Christ Jesus the Being who must accomplish the deed without which humanity on Earth cannot find its way back to the Divine. They should have recognized that the meaning of human existence on Earth does not exist without this Being. Humanity would have had to erase the word “human” from the history of Earth’s development if they had wanted to erase the Christ event.

[ 11 ] Now let us create a mental image of this crowd condemning and raging against the very entity that actually makes human beings human on Earth, the entity that is meant to give the Earth its purpose and meaning. What does this imply? Does it not imply that humanity, in its earthly development at that time, had reached a point where one can say: In those who, back then in Jerusalem, represented human knowledge of the true nature of human beings, the knowledge of the human being was obscured; they did not know what a human being is, what a human being is meant to do on Earth. We are told nothing less than that humanity had reached a point where it had lost itself, where it condemned that which gives it meaning and significance in earthly development. And from the cries of the agitated crowd one could hear what was spoken—not out of wisdom, but out of folly: “We no longer wish to be human; we wish to cast off that which gives us further meaning as human beings.”

[ 12 ] When we consider all this, what we call, for example, in the context of Pauline Christianity, “man’s relationship to sin and guilt” comes to mind in a somewhat different way than usual. Paul means that, in the course of his development, man could fall into sin and guilt that he could not wash away from himself. And that Christ had to come to earth so that it might become possible for man to wash away sin and guilt—and with them everything associated with sin and guilt. That is Paul’s view. And one might say: If this view requires any real proof, that proof is found in the rage and shouting of those who cry out, “Crucify him!” For in this cry lies the fact that people did not know what they themselves were meant to be on earth, that their earlier development was aimed at spreading darkness over their very being.

[ 13 ] This brings us to what might be called “the human soul’s preparatory disposition toward the Christ Being.” This preparatory disposition of the human soul toward the Christ Being consists in the fact that the soul—even if it cannot express this in clear words—feels through what it can experience within itself: I have developed in such a way since the beginning of the Earth that, through what I have within myself, I cannot reach my goal of development. Where is there something I can cling to, something I can take into myself, so that I may reach my goal of development? To feel as though the human being extends far beyond what the soul can initially achieve through its own power, given its development on Earth thus far—this is the preparatory Christian disposition. And when the soul then finds what it must know to be necessarily connected to its being, but for which it finds no strength within itself—when the soul finds what gives it these powers—then this finding is Christ. Then the soul develops its relationship to Christ; then the soul stands, on the one hand, in such a way that it says to itself: At the beginning of the Earth, a being was predestined for me, which has been darkened within me in the course of Earth’s development, and when I now look into this darkened soul, I lack the powers to realize this being. But I turn my spiritual gaze toward Christ, who gives me these powers. — Thus the human soul stands, on the one hand in the manner described, and on the other hand feeling Christ drawing near to it, as in a direct personal relationship with Christ. There it seeks Christ and knows that it cannot find him unless he gives himself through the human development of humanity itself, unless he approaches it from without.

[ 14 ] There is a Christian Church Father who is fairly widely recognized, and who did not shy away from calling Heraclitus, the Greek philosopher, Socrates, and Plato Christians—Christians who were such even before Christianity was founded. Why does this Church Father do this? Indeed, what is today called a denomination obscures many things that were originally luminous Christian teachings. After all, Augustine himself said: “There was something true in all religions, and what was true in all religions was the Christian element within them, before there was a Christianity by name.” Augustine was still allowed to say that. Today, anyone who said the same thing within a Christian denomination would be excommunicated.

[ 15 ] The quickest way to understand what this Church Father meant when he referred to the ancient Greek philosophers as Christians is to try to put ourselves in the minds of those souls who, in the early centuries, sought to define their personal relationship with Christ in a thoughtful way. They did not conceive of Christ as though, prior to the Mystery of Golgotha, he had been disconnected from the development of the Earth. Christ has always had a part in the development of the Earth. Through the Mystery of Golgotha, only his task, his mission in relation to the development of the Earth, has become different from what it was before. To seek Christ in the development of the Earth only from the Mystery of Golgotha onward—that is not Christian! True Christians know that Christ has always had a part in the development of the Earth.

[ 16 ] Let us first turn our attention to the Jewish people. Did the Jewish people know the Christ? I am not speaking now of whether the Jewish people knew the name of the Christ, nor of whether the Jewish people had an awareness of all that I have to say to you, but rather I am speaking of whether someone who truly understands Christianity can say: Judaism had the Christ, Judaism knew the Christ. — After all, one can have any person in one’s midst whom one sees, so to speak, in their outward form, but whose essence one does not recognize, whom one could not characterize because one has not risen to the level of understanding them. I would like to say: In the true Christian sense, ancient Judaism had the Christ, only it did not recognize him in his essence. — Is what I just said Christian? It is Christian, just as surely as it is Pauline.

[ 17 ] Where was the Christ in ancient Judaism? The Old Testament states that when Moses led the Jews out of Egypt into the desert (Exodus 14), a pillar of cloud went before them by day and a pillar of fire by night. It is said that the Jews crossed the sea and that the sea parted for them so that they could wade through it, while the Egyptians drowned behind them as the sea closed. It is told that the Jews grumbled because they had no water, but that at the command of their God, Moses went to a rock, struck water from the rock with his staff, and that this water refreshed the Jews.

[ 18 ] If we were to describe Moses’ leadership of the Jews in a way that is understandable to human beings, we would say: Moses led the Jews by being led himself by his God. Who was this God?

[ 19 ] Let us not answer this ourselves just yet. Let us allow Paul to explain who the God was who led the Jews through the wilderness. In 1 Corinthians 10:1–4, we read the following words of Paul:

[ 20 ] “But I do not want to keep this from you, dear brothers: our fathers were all under the cloud” — he is referring to the pillar of cloud and fire — “and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, which was Christ.”

[ 21 ] So who, according to Paul, was the one who led the Jews, who spoke with Moses, who caused water to flow from the rock, who turned the sea away from the path of the Jews? Only someone who wanted to claim that Paul was not a Christian could claim that it is unchristian to see the Christ in the leading God of the Old Testament, in the Lord of Moses.

[ 22 ] There is a passage in the Old Testament, I believe, that truly poses great difficulties for deeper reflection. It is a passage to which anyone who does not read the Old Testament thoughtlessly, but who wants to understand it in context, returns again and again. “What might this passage mean?” he asks himself. It is the following passage:

[ 23 ] “Then Moses raised his hand and struck the rock twice with his staff. Water gushed out, and the community and their livestock drank. But the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, ‘Because you did not believe in me to sanctify me in the sight of the Israelites, you shall not bring this congregation into the land I am giving them.’” (Numbers 20:11–12)

[ 24 ] Consider this passage in its Old Testament context. When the people grumble, the Lord commands Moses to strike the rock with his staff. Moses strikes the rock with his staff, and water comes out. Everything the Lord commanded is done by Moses and Aaron, and immediately afterward we are told that the Lord reproaches Moses—if it is a reproach—for not having believed in Him. What does this mean? Go through all the commentaries written on this passage and try to understand it with the help of these commentaries. One understands it just as one understands much in the Bible—namely, not really at all—for behind this passage lies a tremendous mystery. What is hidden in this passage is what it seeks to tell us: The One who guided Moses, who appeared to Moses in the burning bush, who led the people through the wilderness, who caused water to flow from the rock—that was the Lord, Christ! But the time had not yet come; Moses himself did not recognize him; Moses still thought he was someone else. That is what it means: that Moses did not believe in the one who commanded him to strike the rock with the staff.

[ 25 ] How did the Lord—Christ—appear to the Jewish people? Well, we hear it said, “by day in a pillar of cloud, by night in a pillar of fire,” through which he parted the waters for their salvation; and he did many other things as well; we need only read about them in the Old Testament. We might say: In cloud and fire manifestations, in the air, in the elemental events of nature, there He was at work, but it never dawned on the ancient Jews: That which appeared in the pillar of cloud, in the pillar of fire, which worked miracles such as the parting of the sea—that also appears in its most essential form within the human soul. Why did this never occur to the ancient Jews? Because the human soul had lost the power to feel its deepest essence within itself; it had lost its power through the course that human development had taken. Thus the Jewish soul could look into nature; it could allow the splendor of the elemental events to take effect upon itself. There, everywhere, it could surmise its God and Lord; within itself, just as it was, directly, it could not find him.

[ 26 ] There we have Christ in the Old Testament; there he was at work, but people did not recognize him. How did he work, this Christ? Well, don’t we see, when we go through the Old Testament, how he worked? The most significant thing Moses had to give his people through the mouth of Yahweh was the Ten Commandments. He had received them from the power of the elements, through which Yahweh spoke to him. Moses did not descend into the depths of his own soul; Moses did not ask, for instance, in solitary meditation: How does God speak in one’s own heart? He went up the mountain, and through the power of the elements the divine Will was revealed to him. Will—that is the fundamental character of the Old Testament. This fundamental character is also often called the character of the Law. Will works through human evolution, and it expresses itself in the laws, for example in the Decalogue, in the Ten Commandments. God has made his will known to humanity through the elements. Will reigns in the evolution of the Earth. This is, as it were, the meaning of the Old Testament, and submission to this will is what the Old Testament demands of humanity in its very essence.

[ 27 ] If we place before our soul what we have just considered, we can summarize the outcome, the result of all this, with the words: The Lord’s will was given to humankind, but humankind did not recognize the Lord, did not recognize the Divine; they did not recognize it in such a way that they would have connected it with their own human soul.

[ 28 ] And now let us turn our attention away from the Jews and toward the Gentiles. Did the Gentiles have Christ? Is it Christian to speak of the Gentiles having had Christ as well? The Gentiles had their mysteries. Those initiated into the mysteries were led to a state where their soul stepped out of their body, where the bond linking body and soul was severed. And when the soul was outside the body, it perceived the mysteries of existence in the spiritual world. Much was connected with these mysteries; various kinds of knowledge rose up to those being initiated into the mysteries. But if one examines what was the highest thing the mystery student could take in, it was that he was placed outside his body before the Christ. Just as Moses was placed before the Christ, so too was the initiate in the mysteries, with his soul outside the body, placed before the Christ. The Christ was also there for the Gentiles, but he was there for them only within the mysteries; he revealed himself to them only when the soul was outside the body. And even though the Gentiles, just as little as the Jews—among whom Christ was also present—recognized the Being just spoken of, the Being before whom the initiates were placed, as Christ, Christ was there for the Gentiles! One could say: Mysteries were established for the Gentiles. Those who were ready and mature were admitted into the Mysteries. Through these Mysteries, Christ worked upon the Gentile world. Why did he work in this way? He worked in this way because, in its development since the beginning of the Earth, the human soul had lost within itself the power to find its true essence through itself. This true essence had to reveal itself to the human soul when it was not bound within humanity, that is, when it was not connected to the body. Thus Christ had to guide people by having them, as it were, stripped of their humanity as initiates in the Mysteries. Christ was also there for the pagans. He guided them within the institutions of the Mysteries. But it was never the case that a human being could have said: If I unfold my own powers, then I will find the meaning of the Earth. This meaning was lost, it was obscured. The powers of the human soul had been pushed down into regions too deep for the soul to be able to give itself the meaning of the Earth through its own powers.

[ 29 ] If we allow ourselves to be influenced by what was given to the initiates, the students of the mysteries, in the pagan mysteries, then it is wisdom. The Jews were given the will through the laws; the students of the pagan mysteries were given wisdom.

[ 30 ] Yet, if we consider what characterizes this pagan wisdom, can we not summarize it in these words: through wisdom, the earthly human being as such—unless he stepped outside his body by becoming a student of the mysteries—could not recognize his God as such? Through wisdom no more than through will could the deity reveal itself to humanity. Indeed, we find a phrase that resonates wonderfully throughout Greek antiquity like a mighty demand upon humanity, but this phrase stood at the entrance to the Apollonian sanctuary—that is, a place of mystery—the phrase: “Know thyself.” What does the fact that this phrase “Know thyself” stood at the entrance to the mystery sanctuary as a call to humanity tell us? It tells us that wherever out there humanity remains as humanity—what it has become since the dawn of the Earth—the demand “Know thyself” cannot be fulfilled; that one must become something other than human, namely, that in the mysteries one must sever the bonds through which the soul is bound to the body in order to know oneself. Thus, this phrase, which stood like a wondrous demand at the Apollonian sanctuary, also points out to us that an eclipse had come over humanity; in other words, that the God could not be reached through wisdom, any more than he could reveal himself directly as will.

[ 31 ] Just as the individual human soul can feel that it cannot muster within itself the powers that give it its earthly purpose, so we see in the course of history that the human soul stands in the Jews in such a way that even Moses, the leader of the Jews, did not recognize the One who guided him. And we see among the Gentiles that the demand “Know thyself” could only be fulfilled in the Mysteries, because human beings, as they have become in the course of earthly evolution with their connection of body and soul, are unable to develop the power through which they can know themselves. The word resounds to us: “It is not by will nor by wisdom that God is to be known.” By what, then, should God be known?

[ 32 ] We have, after all, often described the nature of the moment when Christ entered into the evolution of humanity on Earth. Let us now consider very carefully the meaning of the statement that a certain darkening of the human soul had set in, such that the truly divine could not be revealed through either will or wisdom. What does this actually mean?

[ 33 ] Yes, people speak of various kinds of relationships between the human and the divine. When people speak of the relationship between the human and the divine, and of the meaning that the human has within the divine, they speak of it in such a way that it is often truly impossible to distinguish how the human relates to the divine, and how some other earthly thing, for example, relates to the divine. Even today, we still find that philosophers seek to ascend to the divine through pure philosophy. But one cannot reach the divine through pure philosophy. Certainly, through pure philosophy one comes to know that a divine power reigns in the world and to feel connected to the universe; certainly, one comes to know that the human being must somehow be connected to the universe through death, but how this connection is made—that is something one cannot discover through pure philosophy. Why not? Well, if you take the full meaning of what we have already discussed today, you will be able to say to yourself: What first reveals itself to the earthly human being in his soul between birth and death is simply too weak in its powers to perceive anything that goes beyond the earthly, that leads into the divine-spiritual. To make this quite clear to ourselves, let us now explore the meaning of immortality.

[ 34 ] Many people today no longer even know what the true meaning of human immortality might be. Many people today speak of immortality above all else, even when they can only admit that the human soul, with its essence, passes through the gate of death and then finds some place in the universe. But every being does that. That which is united with the crystal, when it dissolves, passes into the cosmos; the plant that withers passes into the cosmos; the animal that dies passes into the cosmos. For human beings, however, the matter is different. Immortality has meaning for the human being only if they can carry their consciousness through the gate of death. Imagine an immortal human soul that would be unconscious after death. Such immortality would have no meaning, not the slightest meaning. Consciousness must carry the human soul through death if it is to speak of its immortality. Just as the soul is united with the body, it can find nothing within itself of which it could say: This is something I carry consciously through death. For human consciousness is confined between birth and death; it extends only as far as death. Just as the human soul initially possesses this consciousness, so it extends only as far as death. The divine will shines into this consciousness, for example in the Ten Commandments. Read in the Book of Job whether this shining in has been able to bring humanity so far that its consciousness might have been shaken and driven such forces out of itself that it could have said to itself: I pass through the gate of death with consciousness. Oh, how the words spoken to Job strike us: “Curse God and die!” (Job 2:9) We know the man is uncertain whether he is passing through the gate of death with full awareness. And if we add to this the Greek saying that creates a mental image of the Greeks’ fear of death: “Better a beggar in the upper world than a king in the realm of shadows”—then we have evidence even from paganism of how uncertain people had become about human immortality. And how uncertain many people still are even today. All those who say that when a person passes through the gate of death, they merge into the cosmos or unite with some cosmic being, do not consider what the soul must attribute to itself when it wishes to speak of its own immortality.

[ 35 ] We need only utter one word, and we will realize how humanity must relate to its immortality. That word is love. And everything we have said about immortality can now be connected to what the word love signifies. Love is not something we acquire through our will. Love is not something we acquire through wisdom. Love resides in the realm of feelings. But we know—and must admit to ourselves—that the human soul, as it ought to be, could not exist if it were not filled with love. Indeed, when one penetrates the essence of the soul, one realizes that our human soul would cease to be a human soul if it were incapable of love.

[ 36 ] But let us imagine for a moment that we passed through the gate of death in such a way that we lost our human individuality, that we were united with a universal divinity. Then we would be within that divinity; we would be part of it. We could no longer love God; we would be within Him Himself. Love would have no meaning if we were within God. We must admit that if we could not carry our individuality through death, we would lose love in death, and love would cease at the very moment that individuality ceases. Only one being can love another that is separate from the other. If we wish to carry our love of God through death, then we must carry our individuality through death; then we must carry through death that which kindles love within us. If the meaning of the earth were to be revealed to humanity, then humanity would have to be enlightened about its immortality in such a way that its being is conceived as inseparable from love. Neither will nor wisdom can give humanity what it needs; only love can give humanity what it needs.

[ 37 ] What, then, had been obscured in the course of human evolution on Earth? Whether we consider the Jews or the Gentiles: what had been obscured was consciousness beyond death. Consciousness between birth and death; beyond birth and death, darkness—nothing remains of consciousness within the earthly body. “Know thyself!” at the entrance to the Greek sanctuary: the holiest demand of this Greek sanctuary upon humanity. But humanity could only give itself this answer: Yes, if I remain as connected in my body to my soul as I am as an earthly human being, I cannot recognize myself in that individuality which can love beyond death. I cannot do that! The realization that one can love as an individuality beyond death—that was what humanity had lost.

[ 38 ] Death is not the end of the physical body. Only a materialist would say that. Just imagine for a moment that human beings, in every hour they live in the body, possessed a consciousness such that they would know with as much certainty what lies beyond death as they know today that the sun will rise tomorrow and traverse the sky; then death would hold no sting for human beings, then death would not be what we call death, then people in the body would know that death is merely a phenomenon that leads from one form to another. Paul, too, did not understand “death” as the cessation of the physical body, but rather he understood “death” as the fact that consciousness extends only up to death, that man, insofar as he was bound to the body in his earthly life at that time, could extend his consciousness within his body only up to death. We can insert the following wherever Paul speaks of death: “lack of consciousness beyond death.”

[ 39 ] What did the Mystery of Golgotha give to humanity? Did the Mystery of Golgotha present humanity with a series of natural phenomena—a pillar of cloud, a pillar of fire? No, a human being stood before the people: Christ Jesus. Did the Mystery of Golgotha, emerging from the mysterious forces of nature, cause the sea to part so that the people of God might pass through? No, a human being stood there before the people and made the lame walk and the blind see. It all came from a human being.

[ 40 ] The Jew had to look into nature if he wanted to see the one he calls his divine Lord. One could now see a human being; one could speak of a human being in such a way that God lived within him. The pagan had to be initiated; he had to draw the soul out of the body in order to face the being that is Christ. He could not have suspected Christ’s presence on earth; he could only know that Christ was outside of earth. But that which was outside of earth came to earth; it took on a human body.

[ 41 ] In Christ Jesus, the being who had otherwise stood before the soul freed from the body in the mysteries now stood before humanity as a human being. And what has come of this? The beginning was thus made for the forces that humanity had lost in the course of Earth’s evolution since the dawn of time—those forces through which its immortality is guaranteed—to return to humanity through the Mystery of Golgotha. In the overcoming of death on Golgotha, the forces took their origin that can rekindle the lost forces within the human soul. And humanity’s path through earthly evolution will continue in such a way that, as human beings increasingly take Christ into themselves, they will discover within themselves that which can love beyond death—that is, they will be able to stand before their God as immortal individuals. That is why it is only since the Mystery of Golgotha that the saying has become true: “Love God above all else and your neighbor as yourself.” (Luke 10:27)

[ 42 ] Will was given from the burning bush. Will was given through the commandments. Wisdom was given through the mysteries. But love was given when God became human in Christ Jesus. And the assurance that we can love beyond death, that a community of love can be established through the regained powers of our soul between humanity and God and among all people, this assurance springs from the Mystery of Golgotha. In the Mystery of Golgotha, the human soul has found what it had lost since the dawn of the Earth, as its powers grew weaker and weaker.

[ 43 ] Three forces in the three aspects of the human soul: will, wisdom, and love! It is through this love that the soul experiences its relationship with Christ.

[ 44 ] I wanted to bring this to your attention from a certain perspective. What may have sounded aphoristic in today’s discussion will find its context in the reflections of the coming days. But this, I believe, we can engrave deeply in our souls: that progress in the knowledge of Christ is a real gain for the human soul, and that even when we consider the relationship of the human soul to Christ, it becomes clear to us once again how there was, as it were, a veil between the human soul and Christ before the Mystery of Golgotha, how this veil was pierced by the Mystery of Golgotha, and how we can rightly say: Through the Mystery of Golgotha, a cosmic being has flowed into earthly life; a super-earthly being has united with the Earth.

[ 45 ] Allow me, my dear friends, to make a remark today as well—perhaps the coming days will provide another opportunity to do so—but I would like to share this with you as well:

[ 46 ] The accusations and opposition directed at our Spiritual Science teachings are growing ever stronger. These opponents do not, however, base their arguments on much truth, but the opposition is there nonetheless. Let us reflect for a moment on words that you have been able to read here in recent days, words spoken by others and repeated here; let us consider these words at the end of these reflections, which have again shown us from another perspective how a cosmic being becomes an earthly being in Christ—I mean the words that were spoken as if there were something un-Christian about speaking of Christ as a cosmic being. Indeed, the words were even spoken in such a way as to suggest that it was said: “This theosophical or anthroposophical teaching does not see at all how unchristian it is to speak of a cosmic principle, of a cosmic being, whereas it is precisely that which has won people over—what the Gospels recount in detail about the humanity of Jesus.” People who say such things consider themselves quite Christian. But many who consider themselves Christian do not even realize that with their Christianity they are constantly contradicting true Christianity. It is said to be un-Christian to speak of Christ as a being who is a cosmic being—that is, one who is significant not merely for the Earth but for the cosmos! This was said by a party that seeks to defend Christianity against spiritual research. It was said: “Christ, as he appears to us without our taking the cosmic into account, will live in human souls as long as the Earth endures.” I do not believe that many people realize how strangely un-Gospel-like the tongue speaks precisely with such words. One might sometimes notice: Here is opposition to Spiritual Science—well, one can understand that. It is simply the case that this is spoken from a “Christian standpoint.”—But is this Christian standpoint truly a Christian standpoint? It condemns us—for this may well be called condemnation—it claims this as its privilege; it condemns us. It finds our Christianity—or, rather, our anthroposophy as Christianity—questionable. Not only does true Christianity no longer live in its concept, but true Christianity also does not live in the habits of its spiritual life. For the soul that is truly Christian will never say: As long as the earth endures, the Christ referred to here will live in the hearts of people. — Why not? Because a Christian who says that has simply forgotten the words of the Gospels: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” (Matthew 24:35) But this also presents Christ as a cosmic being. And the one who makes a word like “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away” come true—that person speaks as a Christian. But the one whose tongue slips the moment he wants to turn his Christianity against anthroposophy—that person sins against the word “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away” by saying: We want a Christ who works as long as the earth stands; — such a person understands nothing of true Christianity, which is written not merely in books, but also in the stars.

[ 47 ] We must occasionally ask ourselves what spirit lies behind some of the attacks that are being leveled here and there today against the Christian character of our anthroposophy. Sometimes one can tell much more from a slip of the tongue what Christianity has become in such souls than by reading, as is customary today.

[ 48 ] In the coming days, we will discuss what the human soul can experience with Christ within it.