The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Sixth Lecture

[ 1 ] Let us linger a little longer on the reflections we have made regarding the so-called three encounters. We have said that the alternating states in which a person lives during the brief course of twenty-four hours—as they alternate between sleep and wakefulness—are not merely what they appear to be outwardly in physical life, but that within these alternating states, a person encounters the spiritual world each time, as we have indicated that what separates from the physical and etheric bodies during sleep—what is, so to speak, exhaled into the spiritual world upon falling asleep and inhaled again upon waking—namely, the “I” and the astral body— that during the state of sleep these come into contact with that world of beings which we have counted among the hierarchy of the Angeloi, to which the human soul itself will also belong once the spiritual self has been developed, and in which the highest governing principle is that which, in religious life, we have come to call the Holy Spirit. We have discussed in some detail this encounter in the spiritual world, which thus occurs for human beings during every normal state of sleep.

[ 2 ] Now we must be perfectly clear that, as the human race has evolved over the course of Earth’s development, changes have occurred with regard to these matters. What, exactly, is happening when a person sleeps? Well, I would say that I explained this to you last time in terms of the inner workings of the human being. Viewed in relation to the universe, human beings, in a sense, mimic the rhythm of the cosmic order that prevails in any given spot on Earth, where one half of the twenty-four-hour period is day and the other half is night. Certainly, it is always day somewhere on Earth, but human beings inhabit only one spot on Earth, and what has been explained here applies to that spot. For this spot, human beings mimic the rhythm of day and night in their own rhythm of sleeping and waking. The fact that this no longer holds true for modern life—that is, that human beings are not compelled to stay awake precisely during the day and sleep at night— is connected to the fact that, in the course of evolution, human beings have generally detached themselves from the objective course of the world, and that only the same rhythm exists within them—not, however, that two rhythms, their rhythm of sleep and wakefulness and the rhythm of day and night, run evenly in parallel. In a sense, they are the same—in one instance for the universe, for the macrocosm, and in the other for human beings, the microcosm—but they are shifted relative to one another. It is solely through this that human beings are, in a certain sense, beings independent of the macrocosm.

[ 3 ] Well, in earlier times—those earlier times when, as we know, people possessed a certain atavistic clairvoyance—people also aligned themselves more closely with the great rhythm of the world order. In earlier times, people slept in such a way that they were awake during the day and slept at night. As a result, however, the entire range of human experience in those earlier times was different from what it is today. Human beings had to be, so to speak, lifted out of their parallelism with the macrocosm in order to develop, precisely through this lifting out, through this breaking away, a more active, inner, independent life. One cannot say that the main point here is that people in earlier times slept in such a way that they actually observed the stars very little. For they did indeed observe them, despite what the external science of astronomy claims—which is, however, something entirely different. Rather, the essential point was that human beings were integrated into the entire world order in a completely different way: while the Sun was on the other side of the Earth—and thus did not directly exert its influence on their particular spot on Earth—they were, in that moment, devoted to the stars with their I and astral body, which existed apart from the physical and etheric bodies. As a result, he did not merely perceive the physical stars, but he perceived that which belongs to the physical stars in a spiritual sense. He did not actually look at the physical stars with his outer eyes, but rather he looked at what belongs to the physical stars in a spiritual sense. Therefore, we must not interpret what is told about the ancient star cult as though these ancient people had merely gazed at the stars and then symbolized them, creating all sorts of beautiful images and symbols. It is easy to say, in the spirit of modern science: “Well, in earlier times people’s imaginations were simply active; they imagined gods in Saturn, the Sun, and the Moon; through their imagination, they envisioned animal forms in the zodiac constellations.” — What is active in this realm is only the imagination of modern scholars, who invent such things! But what is true is that in that state of consciousness in which the “I” and the astral body of these ancient people existed, things truly appeared as they are described there, so that what is described was actually beheld and perceived. Through this, however, human beings had a direct perception of the spirit that permeates the universe; they lived in communion with this spirit that permeates the universe.

[ 4 ] In reality, it is only our physical body and etheric body that are truly adapted to the Earth. Just as our “I” and astral body are, so too are they adapted to the Spirit that permeates the universe in the manner just described. We can say that our “I” and our astral body belong to this realm of the universe, but human beings are meant to develop in such a way that they can truly experience, from within their “I” and their astral body, that which is the innermost essence of their “I” and their astral body. To this end, the outer experience that existed in ancient times had to disappear for a while; it had to be obscured. The communication of consciousness with the stars had to diminish, had to fade, so that the inner being of the human being might be strengthened to such an extent that, in the future, he might learn to draw strength from this inner being, enabling him to find the Spirit as a spirit. Just as the ancient human being was connected to the spirit of the starry world during each night’s sleep, so too was the human being connected to the spirit of the starry world throughout the course of the year; only now, during the course of the year, did he come into contact with a higher spirit of the starry world—with what, so to speak, takes place within the starry world. During nighttime sleep, the forms of the stars in their stillness had a particular effect on him; over the course of the year, the effect was that of the change associated with the sun’s path throughout the year—and, one might say, associated through the sun’s path with the fate of the Earth as it passes through the seasons, particularly through summer and winter.

[ 5 ] Yes, you see, while certain traditions have relatively survived with regard to the experiences people had in ancient times with nighttime sleep, relatively few traditions—or rather, those whose origins are scarcely discernible—have survived from those even older times when people participated in the mysteries of the cycle of the year. But the echoes of these experiences concerning the mysteries of the annual cycle have been preserved; they are simply little understood. Look among the myths of various peoples for those that repeatedly attest to the fact that everywhere, people knew something of a struggle between winter and summer, and between summer and winter. Once again, conventional scholarship sees in this merely a symbol of the creative imagination of ancient people—an imagination that has been left behind in an age when we have made such magnificent progress. Yet these, too, were real experiences that humanity went through—experiences that played a significant and profound role in the entire spiritual and cultural context of ancient times. There were mysteries in which one certainly anticipated the revelation of the secrets of the year. Let us imagine for a moment what significance such mysteries held. They were different in very ancient times and different in those periods into which ancient Egyptian history extends, but also into which ancient Greek history extends, and even the earliest Roman history extends to some extent. So let us speak of those mysteries that, in a sense, fade away with the older Egyptian, Greek, and Roman cultures.

[ 6 ] These mysteries still retained a sense of the Earth’s connection to the entire universe. For this reason, suitable individuals were selected—today, of course, such a procedure would no longer be permissible—but at that time, suitable individuals were selected and subjected to a very specific psychological treatment, and who were then employed during a specific period—a series of days in winter—in locations specially prepared for this purpose, so that they might, as it were, serve as a receiving station for whatever the universe—the extraterrestrial universe—can reveal to the Earth precisely during these times, when the Earth offers a sufficient receiving station. In earlier times, it was not our current Christmas season that was directly decisive, but one that was more or less close to it. But that is not what matters now. Let us take our Christmas season; let us take the period from December 24th and 25th into January. This is indeed a time when, due to the special alignment of the Sun with the Earth, the cosmos communicates something different to the Earth than at other times. It is the time when the cosmos speaks more intimately to the Earth than at other times. But this more intimate communication is based precisely on the fact that the Sun does not unfold its summer power during this time, that this summer power of the Sun has, in a certain sense, receded. The leaders of the ancient mysteries used this time to conduct, in specially prepared locations with trained individuals, the very activities that made it possible for them to receive the intimate secrets from the cosmos—secrets that descend to Earth during this intimate dialogue between the cosmos and the Earth. Today we can compare this to something much more trivial, but a comparison can still be made. As you know, so-called wireless telegraphy is based on the generation of electrical waves, which propagate without wires, and on the installation of devices—called coherers—at specific locations; through their special design, these devices make it possible to capture the electrical waves right at the station and set the coherers in motion. This is based quite simply on the organization—I would say on the shaping—of the metal shavings in the coherer, which are then shaken back into place once the wave has passed through. Now imagine: the mysteries of the universe, of the extraterrestrial universe, pass through the Earth at this specific time I have indicated. All that is needed is a receiving apparatus; for the electrical waves would pass by the receiving station without leaving a trace if one did not have the receiving apparatus with the coherer. One needed, so to speak, a coherer for whatever emerges from the universe. The ancient Greeks used their Pythias—their priestesses, who were trained for this purpose—as such coherers; and because they were exposed to what came down from the universe, they were able to reveal these secrets of the universe. These secrets of the universe, however, were then interpreted by those who, by that time, were perhaps no longer capable of serving as the receiving station themselves. But the mysteries of the universe had been revealed. All of this was, of course, carried out under the sign of the holiest mystery—a sign of which our present age, having lost all that is sacred, no longer has any concept. For our present age would, of course, be intent above all on interviewing the priest of the mysteries.

[ 7 ] So, what exactly were these Mystery priests all about? The point was that they knew, in a certain sense, that if they incorporated into their knowledge—specifically their social knowledge—that fertilization of earthly life which flows down from the universe, then, through the very things that had made them wiser, they could take the necessary measures for the coming period: the legal and other measures for the coming year. There have indeed been times on Earth when social or legal measures would not have been taken without first exploring, in this way, the mysteries of the macrocosm through those who were to implement them. Later times have preserved gloomy, dubious echoes of this great endeavor in superstitious beliefs. When lead is poured on New Year’s Eve in an attempt to divine the future of the coming year, this is the superstitious remnant of that great, sacred endeavor of which I have just spoken to you. Its true purpose was to enliven the human spirit—in such a way that what can flow only from the universe as a whole was transmitted to the earth, because the intention was for human beings on earth to live in such a way that their lives would not merely be the result of what can be experienced on earth, but the result of what can be experienced from the universe. Likewise, it was known that during the summer months the Earth stands in a completely different relationship to the universe, that during the summer months, so to speak, the Earth cannot receive intimate communications from the universe. This was the basis for the summer mysteries, which aimed at something entirely different, but which we need not discuss today.

[ 8 ] Well, as I said, even fewer traditions have survived regarding these matters—which pertain to the mysteries of the cycle of the year—than those concerning the rhythm of day and night, of sleep and wakefulness. But in those ancient times, when human beings still possessed that higher degree of atavistic clairvoyance through which they could perceive, over the course of the year, the intimate interactions that took place between the universe and the Earth—in those ancient times, people knew that what they were experiencing there stemmed from the fact that human beings had an encounter there—an encounter they naturally had at all times, though back then it was perceived only through atavistic clairvoyance—with that spiritual world which they cannot now experience in every sleep: the encounter with the spiritual world in which those spiritual beings live whom we count among the hierarchy of the Archangels, that world in which human beings will dwell with their innermost being once their life spirit has been developed during the Venus epoch; that world in which, in ancient times, one had to conceive of Christ, the Son, as the guiding, ruling principle. So that one can indeed also call this encounter—which human beings have with the spiritual world over the course of the year at any point on Earth during the time that is the Christmas-winter season for that particular point on Earth—one can indeed also call this encounter the encounter with the Son. Thus, over the course of a year, human beings truly experience a rhythm that mirrors the annual cycle itself and in which they are united with the world of the Son.

[ 9 ] But we know, of course, that through the Mystery of Golgotha, that Being whom we call the Christ united Himself with the course of Earth’s history. Precisely at the time when this union took place—as is evident from the remarks I have just made—the direct perception of the spiritual world had become clouded. We see the objective fact: The event of Golgotha is connected with the transformation of human development on Earth itself. But we may therefore also say: There were times in Earth’s development when people, in the sense of ancient atavistic clairvoyance, came into a relationship with the Christ through becoming acquainted with the Earth’s intimate dialogue with the macrocosm. And this is the basis for what some reasonable modern scholars and religious researchers assume, with a certain degree of justification: that there was a primordial revelation of the Earth. But it came about just as I have described it. A primordial revelation. And the various religions across the Earth are the fragments of that primordial revelation that have fallen into decadence.

[ 9 ] But we know, of course, that through the Mystery of Golgotha, that Being whom we call the Christ united Himself with the course of Earth’s history. Precisely at the time when this union took place—as is evident from the remarks I have just made—the direct perception of the spiritual world had become clouded. We see the objective fact: The event of Golgotha is connected with the transformation of human development on Earth itself. But we may therefore also say: There were times in Earth’s development when people, in the sense of ancient atavistic clairvoyance, came into a relationship with the Christ through becoming acquainted with the Earth’s intimate dialogue with the macrocosm. And this is the basis for what some reasonable modern scholars and religious researchers assume, with a certain degree of justification: that there was a primordial revelation of the Earth. But it came about just as I have described it. A primordial revelation. And the various religions across the Earth are the fragments of that primordial revelation that have fallen into decadence.

[ 11 ] So here we are dealing with something in which human beings are not yet entirely free, where they are not yet meant to stand out so much from the objective course of the universe, where they are meant to become aware each year, now that they can no longer communicate with the universe through atavistic clairvoyance, that something lives within them that belongs to the universe and finds its expression in the cycle of the year.

[ 12 ] Now, among the things for which spiritual science is perhaps most frequently criticized—particularly by certain religious denominations—is the fact that, through spiritual science, the Christ impulse must once again be linked to the entire universe. Spiritual science takes nothing away—as I have often emphasized—from what religious traditions have to say about the mystery of Christ Jesus; but it adds what this mystery of Christ Jesus encompasses in terms of its relationship from Earth to the entire universe. It seeks Christ not only on Earth; it seeks him throughout the entire universe. Actually, it is difficult to understand why certain religious denominations repeatedly criticize precisely this linking of the Christ impulse to cosmic events; for it would only be understandable if spiritual science were to take something away from the legitimate traditions of Christianity; if it adds something, that should obviously not be criticized. But well, that is simply the way things are, and the reasons lie in the fact that one does not want anything added to certain traditions at all.

[ 13 ] But there is a profoundly serious background to this matter—a background that is particularly important for our time, indeed extraordinarily important. You see, I have often drawn attention to this, and it is also discussed in the first of my Mystery Dramas: that we are living in anticipation of the time when we can speak of a spiritual return of Christ. I need not elaborate further on this today; it is, after all, well known to all our friends. This Christ event, however, will not merely be an event that satisfies people’s transcendental curiosity; rather, it will above all be an event that will demand of human minds a new understanding—a new understanding of the entire Christ impulse. Certain fundamental words of Christianity—which were meant to spread like sacred impulses throughout the entire world, at least throughout the world of those who wish to take the Christ impulse into themselves—are still not understood deeply enough. I would like to recall here only the significant, profound words: “My kingdom is not of this world.” This saying—when Christ appears in a kingdom that is truly not of this world, namely, not of the world of the senses—will take on a renewed meaning. For it must become a profound characteristic of the Christian worldview that this Christian worldview will be able to show understanding toward all other human worldviews, with the sole exception of crude, gross materialism. Once one realizes that religions are remnants of ancient visions—that all religions across the earth are remnants of ancient visions—then it will be essential that this be taken very seriously. What was once beheld—and because humanity later became incapable of such vision, it survives only in fragmentary form within the various religious denominations—can be recognized anew precisely through Christianity. And so, through Christianity, one can acquire a deep understanding of every form of religious belief on Earth—not only the major religions, but every form of religious belief on Earth. This, of course, is something that is easy to say, but as easy as it is to say, so difficult is it to actually become the true mindset of people. And it will have to become the mindset of people—the mindset of people across the entire earth. For, just as Christianity has appeared on earth so far, it is one religion among others, one faith among other faiths. That is not its purpose. Christianity was established precisely to spread understanding across the entire earth. Christ was not born or died for a limited group of people, but for all people. And in a certain sense, there is a contradiction between the requirement inherent in Christianity to apply to all people and the fact that it has become a particular creed. But it is not destined to be a particular creed. It can only become a particular confession if one fails to grasp it in its deepest sense. And this deepest sense also includes the cosmic perspective.

[ 14 ] Yes, even today we still struggle to find words for certain truths, because they are actually so far removed from people today that there are no words to express them. Often, these great truths can only be expressed in comparative terms. But remember that I have often explained that Christ can be called the Sun Spirit. From reflections such as those I have made today—from the contemplation of the Sun’s annual course—one can already see that there is, in a certain sense, justification for regarding Christ as the Sun Spirit; as the Sun Spirit. However, one will not be able to conceive of this Sun Spirit as the Sun Spirit at all unless one takes into account the cosmic significance of Christ, unless one understands the Mystery of Golgotha precisely as a true Christ Mystery—as something that, while it took place on this Earth, has significance for the entire universe and is an event for the entire universe.

[ 15 ] Well, people argue about many things on Earth; they are divided over many things. They are divided with regard to their religious beliefs; they believe themselves to be divided by their nationalities and by other things as well. And these divisions give rise to times such as the one in which we are living now, for example. People are divided; they are also divided with regard to the Mystery of Golgotha. For no Chinese or Indian will readily accept what a European missionary says about the Mystery of Golgotha. For anyone who looks at the situation as it is, this will not be a particularly striking fact. But there is one thing on which people have not yet become divided. It is almost hard to believe, but it is a trivial truth, and one must believe it. When one considers how people on Earth live in relation to one another today, one can hardly help but be surprised that there is still something on which they are not divided. Yet there are still things on which people are not divided, and one example is the view people hold of the sun. The Japanese, the Chinese, even the Americans and the British do not believe that a different sun rises and sets for them than it does for the Germans. People still believe in a common sun; in fact, people still believe in what we have in common when it comes to the supernatural. In this regard, they do not even dispute these matters or wage wars over them. And let this serve as a kind of comparison.

[ 16 ] As I said, these things can only be expressed in relative terms. Once one grasps the connection between Christ and these things—about which people do not argue—then one will not argue about Christ either; then one will see him in the kingdom that is not of this world and that is his kingdom. But unity regarding the matters on which unity should prevail throughout the entire earth will not prevail until people have recognized the cosmic significance of Christ. For you will be able to speak to the Jew, the Chinese, the Japanese, and the Indian about the cosmic significance of Christ just as you speak to the Christian European. And this opens up an immensely significant perspective—on the one hand for the further development of Christianity on Earth, and on the other hand for the further development of humanity on Earth. For we must seek paths to spiritual truths that all people can truly understand in the same way. But this will become a necessity in the time when the return—the spiritual return—of Christ takes place. And a deeper understanding will have to emerge from this time, particularly with regard to the words “My kingdom is not of this world”—a deep understanding that within the human being there lives not only the earthly but also the super-earthly; the super-earthly that lives in the annual course of the sun. One must come to feel that just as, in the life of each individual human being, the soul governs the body, so too in all that happens out there—in the rising and setting stars, in the shining and fading sunlight—the spiritual lives; that, just as we are connected to the air through our lungs, we are connected to the spiritual realm of the universe through our soul—but not to the abstract spirituality of a vague pantheism, but to the concrete spirituality that manifests itself in individual beings. And so we will find that, in intimate connection with what lives in the course of the year—just as the breaths live within a human being—there lives something spiritual that belongs to the human soul, that is the human soul itself; that the Christ Being, who passed through the Mystery of Golgotha, belongs to the course of the year in its mysteries. We must already begin to connect what has historically taken place on Earth in the Mystery of Golgotha with the great mysteries of the world, with the macrocosmic mysteries. But then something of immense importance will flow from this understanding: from this understanding, insight will in turn flow regarding what people need socially. Social science, for example, is widely pursued in our time, and much is also driven by all manner of social ideals. Certainly, nothing should be objected to in this regard, but all these things must be enriched—and will have to be enriched—by what will dawn upon human beings as they themselves once again spiritualize the course of the year. For it is by vividly experiencing, as it were, the reflection of the Mystery of Golgotha each year—in parallel with the course of the year—that one is once again inspired by what social knowledge and social feeling can be.

[ 17 ] What I am about to say will certainly seem utterly convoluted to people today, but it is nonetheless true. If, on the other hand, the course of the year is perceived in a generally human way—that is, in inner connection with the Mystery of Golgotha—then this placing of the soul’s feeling within the course of the year and within the mystery of Golgotha will simultaneously pour forth a genuine social feeling across the earth. This will be the true solution—or at least the continuation—of what is today so foolishly called the “social question,” given what is actually meant by it. But it is precisely through spiritual science that we must acquire an understanding of the connection between the human being and the universe. This will, of course, require that we begin to see more in this universe than what today’s materialism sees in it.

[ 18 ] It is precisely those things that are given the least value today that are the most important. Today’s materialistic biology, materialistic natural science, compares humans to animals. It finds, well, only a gradual difference. Of course, it is correct within its own field. But what it completely overlooks is the relationship of human beings to the directions in the universe. The animal spine—and here the exceptions truly prove the rule—the animal spine is oriented parallel to the Earth’s surface, extending out into the universe. The human spine is oriented toward the Earth. As a result, “up” and “down” mean something entirely different for humans than they do for animals. Consequently, this “up” and “down” is what defines the human being in his entire being. In animals, the spine is directed out into the infinite distances of the macrocosm; in humans, it is the upper part of the head—the brain—and the human being is integrated into the entire macrocosm. This signifies something immense. For this determines the relationship between the spiritual and the physical in human beings. Consequently, their spiritual and physical aspects are also placed within the relationship of up and down. We will speak more about these things later; but for now, I would like to outline them. This relationship of up and down characterizes what we might call the “going out” of the “I” and the astral body during sleep. For in fact, while awake, the human being is connected to the Earth through his physical body and etheric body, while his “I” and astral body are connected to the heavens. During the night, he is, so to speak, connected upward; he is connected upward with his “I” and astral body.

[ 19 ] And now we ask: Yes, “what about it—aren’t there other opposites in the macrocosm? There is, in fact, the very opposite that can be described for human beings as ‘forward’ and ‘backward.’ However, in relation to forward and backward, human beings are integrated into the entire macrocosm in a different way than, for example, animals or even plants. Human beings are integrated in such a way that this integration toward forward and backward indeed corresponds to an integration into the sun’s orbit. And this forward and backward—that is the direction that corresponds to the rhythm that human beings experience in life and death. Just as human beings, in sleeping and waking, express, so to speak, the living relationship between above and below, so too do they express, in life and death, the relationship between forward and backward. But this forward and backward is aligned with the course of the sun, so that “forward” for human beings means toward the east, and “backward” means toward the west. And east and west—these are the second spatial directions, and they are the ones we can speak of in reality when we say that the human soul—not in sleep, but in death—leaves the human body. For it leaves the human body in the direction of the east. This is found only in those traditions where one speaks of a person’s death as their “entering the eternal East.” Such ancient traditional expressions will one day—or perhaps already today—be described by scholarship as symbolisms. For example, people will one day point out the triviality of it: the sun rises in the east, which is a beautiful thing; so one also refers to eternity by speaking of the east! But this corresponds to a reality—namely, the reality of the sun’s annual course even more than its daily course.

[ 20 ] The third difference, however, is that between the inner and the outer. Up and down, east and west, inner and outer. We live an inner life; we live an outer life. The day after tomorrow, in our public lecture, we will also be speaking about this inner and outer life under the topic: “The Human Soul and the Human Body.” We live an inner life, and we live an outer life. For human beings, this inner and outer is just as much a contrast as up and down, east and west. While, in the course of the year, human beings are more concerned with what I would call a representative depiction of the entire course of life, one can say: When we speak of the inner and the outer, we are dealing with human life and death—with the entire course of a human life, particularly insofar as it involves a descending and ascending development. As you know, up to a certain age, a person experiences roughly an ascending development. Then their overall growth ceases, remains still for a time, and then begins to decline.

[ 21 ] Now, it is connected to this entire course of human life that, at the beginning of life, the human being is most closely connected—in a natural, elemental way—to the spiritual realm throughout his or her entire physical being. I would say that at the beginning of life, a human being is constituted in exactly the opposite way than when he has reached middle age, the peak of his ascending development. In the early stages of life, a human being grows, flourishes, and gains in size; then he begins to enter a phase of descending development. This is connected to the fact that, at that point, a person’s physical forces are no longer, in and of themselves, forces of growth, but rather that forces of decay are mingled with these forces of growth. At that point, the inner being of a person stands in a relationship to the universe similar to that which the outer, physical being has to the universe at the beginning of life, at birth. A complete reversal takes place. Therefore, in the unconscious, human beings today experience an encounter at this time—in the middle of life—with the Father Principle, with that spiritual being we count among the hierarchy of the Archai; with that spiritual world in which human beings will dwell once they have fully developed their spiritual self.

[ 22 ] We may now ask: Is this, too, somehow connected to the entire universe? Is there something in the life of the universe that, just as the rhythm of day and night is connected to the Spirit Encounter and the rhythm of the year to the Son Encounter, is connected to the Life Course Encounter and the Father Encounter at the midpoint of the life course? We can ask this question. Well, we must note this: with regard to this “Father Encounter,” human beings are, once again—just as with the “Spirit Encounter”—removed from the rhythm. The rhythm does not run entirely parallel. For people are not born at the same time, but at different times; consequently, their life courses cannot be parallel, but they can internally reflect some spiritual, cosmic event. Do they do so?

[ 23 ] Now, if we consider what is contained in the short treatise “The Education of the Child from the Perspective of Spiritual Science” as well as in other writings and lecture cycles, we know that: During the first seven years of life, a person primarily develops their physical body; during the next seven years, the etheric body; during the following seven years, the astral body; during the next seven years, the feeling soul; and then the intellectual or emotional soul from the ages of 28 to 35. The encounter with the Father Principle also takes place during this period. It extends over these years—not in the sense that it merely spans them, but that it occurs during these years—so that one can say: The human being is prepared for this by the time they reach their 28th, 29th, and 30th years. For most people, this encounter takes place deep within the innermost recesses of the human soul. We must therefore also assume that something in the cosmos corresponds to this period; that is to say, we must find something in the cosmos that represents a cycle, a rhythm. Just as the rhythm of day and night equals 24 hours, and the course of a year equals 365 days, so we must find something in the cosmos—only it must be more comprehensive. After all, all of this relates to the Sun or at least to the solar system. So there would have to be something—I would say—greater than the Sun at work, something that is more comprehensive to the same extent that the 28, 29, or 30-year cycles are more comprehensive in relation to the 24 hours and the 365 days; some kind of orbit. Now, the ancients were right to regard Saturn as the outermost planet of our solar system. It is the outermost planet. The fact that Uranus and Neptune are also included is certainly fully justified from the standpoint of materialistic astronomy, but they have a different origin; they do not belong to the solar system, so we can already say that Saturn marks the boundary of the solar system. So ask yourself: If Saturn marks the boundary of the solar system, we could say: Then, as Saturn orbits, it is actually circling the outermost boundary of the solar system. Isn’t it true that when you consider Saturn, and it orbits, returning once again to its starting point, it traces the outermost boundary of the solar system? And when it orbits the Sun, upon returning to the same point, it stands in the same relationship to the Sun as it did at the starting point. Now Saturn completes its orbit—as we can say today according to the Copernican model of the universe—in a period of 29 to 30 years, which corresponds to this time. There, in Saturn’s orbit around the Sun—which is still not fully understood today—the situation is actually quite different, but the Copernican model of the universe is not yet advanced enough to understand — the relationship that extends to the very outer reaches of the solar system, the event expressed in Saturn’s outermost orbit around the Sun, with which the course of human life is now connected, so that it is a reflection of this Saturnian orbit, insofar as this life course leads the human being to the encounter with the Father. This, too, leads us out into the macrocosm.

[ 24 ] I believe I have thus shown that the very essence of the human being can truly be understood only when one conceives of it in relation to the non-earthly. This non-earthly aspect is then, as the spiritual, organized—I would say—in what it turns toward us, and in a certain sense, visibly turns toward us. But what it visibly presents to us is merely the expression of the spiritual. And humanity’s elevation above materialism will only occur when knowledge is advanced to the point where it transcends the perception of merely earthly conditions and, in turn, rises to comprehend the worlds of the stars and the sun.

[ 25 ] I have already hinted that many things—which today’s conventional wisdom can scarcely even imagine—are connected to these matters. Today, people believe that they will one day be able to create living beings from inorganic matter in a laboratory. Today, materialism exploits this idea. One need not be a materialist to believe that a living being can be created from inorganic matter in a laboratory setting; this is attested to by the belief of the alchemists—who were certainly not materialists—that they could create homunculi. Today this is interpreted in a materialistic sense. But the time will come when it will become true—that is, when it will be felt inwardly—that when one enters a laboratory where a human being is at work—for the time will come when living beings can be created from non-living matter in a laboratory setting—one will have to say to the person doing this: “Welcome to the Star of the Hour!” because this will not be possible at just any hour, but will depend on the constellation of the stars. For whether life arises from the inanimate depends on forces that are not on Earth, but come from the universe.

[ 26 ] Much is connected with these mysteries. Now, it is indeed possible—and we will speak about such things in the coming times—to say quite a bit about these matters, about these things of which even Saint-Martin, the so-called unknown philosopher, says in various places in his book on Truths and Errors that he thanks God that they are shrouded in deep mystery. They cannot remain shrouded in deep mystery, because people will need them for their further development; but it is essential that, in regard to all these things, people once again cultivate that seriousness and that sense of holiness, without which these insights certainly cannot be put to proper use for the world.

[ 27 ] We'll talk more about these things next time.