The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Essential Aspects of Consciousness for the Present and the Future VII

[ 1 ] In the course of our recent reflections, you have seen that the efforts that have come to light here were aimed at shaping the concepts we seek to acquire through spiritual science in such a way that they can be of service to us in perceiving and understanding what surrounds us daily, even hourly, in today’s cultural context. If we now wish to add a few more thoughts to these reflections—as a sort of final appendix, so to speak—it can and should only be done in aphoristic form. The aim is to highlight some significant characteristics of our present age and to relate them to various aspects of what has already been touched upon here and there as a fundamental theme in the previous reflections.

[ 2 ] If one is willing to consider what stands out most strikingly in our time, one will find that, among the various inhibiting and hindering factors of the present, the foremost is that the way of thinking and the mode of perception that have emerged over the course of development in recent centuries lead people to have little foresight regarding the events that lie ahead. This is evident in the fact that most of what is happening to people right now comes as a surprise—a surprise in the truest sense of the word—and they have no way whatsoever of gaining any sense of foresight. They think it must be this way: that one is bound to be taken by surprise, especially by the most significant events. When one speaks of something that is to come, people are astonished, or they may even be ironic about the apparent longing for some kind of prophecy. If, for example—though based on the circumstances arising from such premises as those recently mentioned here—one were to draw attention to what is now sweeping across the world from the Far East, one would, despite the fact that it is already announcing itself all too clearly, still find little understanding and little belief today. There is far too little desire to look clearly into things. This is also related to the fact that people are so reluctant to engage with truths that, within the limits where this is even possible, point to future events. Of course, as you know, we are not speaking here of any kind of fortune-telling, nor of any prophecy to be regarded in a negative sense; rather, we are always speaking of a serious scientific way of thinking and attitude. If we wish to reflect a little on the reasons for the character trait we have just discussed in the present, we may have to look quite far afield for these reasons. But people are usually not at all aware of how far removed the reasons for something are from the very thing for which they are the reasons. They usually look for them far too close at hand.

[ 3 ] If I wish to cite reasons for what I have just described, I must look for them in a tendency that is deeply rooted in the human soul in the present age: a tendency toward dead concepts and ideas, toward concepts and ideas that lack vitality. It should be understandable that one cannot think about the future, about what is yet to come, in the same way one thinks about the past and established facts. But today people focus only on what, as they say, can be proven, and when they speak of this “provability,” they are referring precisely to the particular kind of proof that is so highly valued today. Anyone who truly understands this particular method of proof knows that it can only be used to prove truths that relate to what is passing away in the universe. That is why, in the present, we wish to have only a science or a form of knowledge that relates to what is passing away. It is precisely those people who consider themselves the most enlightened who love only a form of knowledge that relates to what is passing away. They also love only a will that relates to what is passing away. I would say that, in the broadest sense of the word—even if we are not conscious of it—we wish to manage only what is perishing in the present. We do not muster the courage to think of what is coming into being, because what is coming into being cannot be encompassed in such rigid, narrowly defined concepts—which can be proven—as that which is perishing. And today, people shield themselves against all the challenges that actually arise from what I have just described.

[ 4 ] If one speaks out against these things—and one must speak out against them—then one runs the risk of being accused of being a terrible dreamer, a dilettante, and the like, or perhaps something even worse. Today, people are actively seeking terms that can shield them from having to think about what is fruitful and has the potential to take root for the future. In this regard, one concept must be instilled in those who consider themselves the most intelligent, the leaders: the concept of the “conservation of matter and energy,” as it is understood today. It goes without saying that today, in certain circles, anyone who does not admit that this is a fundamental truth of all scientific inquiry—namely, the indestructibility of force and matter—is considered “cattle.” And yet the fact is this: When we truly immerse ourselves in contemplating the universe, what we refer to as matter and energy is transitory, fleeting; and all science, all knowledge we can gain about matter and energy, is the science of something transitory. Because one wants only the science of something transitory, because one wants only to manage the transitory in science, one dogmatically decrees—in order to have something firm and lasting after all—that matter, which nevertheless refers only to something transitory, is eternal, or that energy is eternal. This law of the conservation of matter and energy plays a major role even for those who do not engage with the relevant science—such a role, in fact, that it is woven into everything. Our scientific education is such that what emerges as a reflection of the idea of the conservation of matter and energy finds its way into all popular literature and becomes something people take for granted.

[ 5 ] Now, from *An Outline of Esoteric Science*, we know about the evolution through the Saturn, Sun, Moon, and Earth eras, and so on. Nothing of what is today called matter and force goes beyond what is referred to as the Venusic stage of development. Thus, even for the most enduring forms of matter, what extends up to the Venusic stage of development has thereby come to an end. We are past the midpoint of our world evolution, as far as we can perceive it, and we are in the fifth period of Earth’s evolution, past its midpoint. We have passed the midpoint; we are already living in the waning period of Earth’s evolution—that is, in the era in which the downward evolution, the passing away of matter and force, has taken hold. And the correct perspective, when we study physics and chemistry, would be to say to ourselves: The insights we gain in physics and chemistry are insights that relate only to the transitory—to that which, in the universe, will disappear at the latest with the evolution of Venus. Within the entire scope of what is sought as science today, there is nothing that relates to the enduring; for with ideas and concepts that can be “proven” today in the popular sense, one can find only that which is transitory in the sense just described. One moves only within the transitory.

[ 6 ] As you can see, a fundamental revision of these concepts is necessary in this most fundamental area, and it is precisely those people who today consider themselves to be particularly well-educated in the sciences who will have to learn a great deal so that they can replace their current concepts with the correct ones. But why am I saying all this, since the matter, in its generality, may not seem particularly important after all?

[ 7 ] It is important, after all, because the concepts that people adopt today in accordance with the direction just described—the concepts that permeate all thought today—also shape the other concepts by which one acts, by which one directs one’s will. Social concepts and political concepts take shape according to the way of thinking that one has formed in this manner. They take shape according to the peculiar use one makes of such forces, which consists in wanting to manage only the transitory within these concepts, and this also carries over into one’s concepts of life. This becomes particularly evident when one examines the programmatic points of those who, in their self-confidence, consider themselves the most progressive of all—for example, the programmatic points of certain socialists, precisely those socialists who are making a tremendous amount of noise today and who, after all, all derive their starting point, to a greater or lesser extent, from the theory of Karl Marx. This Marxist theory is, after all, the misfortune of Russia at present, because—for reasons I elaborated on last time—what is happening in Russia, given its historical conditions, can happen there precisely as a result of Marxism. This view is also, at the same time, the most extreme expression of the will to manage only that which is passing away. Anyone who familiarizes themselves with the ideas of this school of thought knows that those who fanatically profess the ideas of this Marxism believe they possess ideas that point to the future. Yet precisely in these ideas, in the social sphere, they have ones that can refer only to what is passing away. This stands out in a naive way precisely in this so-called socialist worldview, for it refuses everywhere to formulate fruitful ideas for the future. It actually preaches the blessing of ideality. It often employs the formula: One must do away with what currently exists; then something will emerge of its own accord from the jumble, without one having to think about it. That is put in radical terms. But even if those who express this radically—in the sense of the last reflection we had eight days ago—are well-educated in the spirit of the Church throughout the centuries and do nothing other than point out the events of the last few centuries as they have unfolded within the Church, one must still say the following: In truth, this view seeks to completely reject the nurturing of nascent ideas; it wants only ideas that relate to what is being destroyed; it can produce only ideas with which institutions can be brought to ruin. One believes one has nascent ideas; but that is not what matters—rather, how the ideas manifest themselves in reality. In truth, these ideas are not at all concerned with exploring anything new, but are solely focused on introducing destructive elements into an existing institution. This socialism strikes me as a lady—though for people today that is certainly a thing of the past—who cannot stand her crinoline. She hated the wide hoop skirt. “That must be changed,” she said. And what did she do? She padded it out. So from the outside it looked exactly the same as before, but on the inside it was lined with padding. That is how these socialists operate: they do not think of enriching the institutions that history has brought forth with new ideas, but rather of leaving them as they are—only to replace the previous administrators with themselves. They keep the crinoline and pad it out. There, too—in an extreme view—is merely the longing to manage what is falling apart, what is dying. What is the basis for this?

[ 8 ] It is based on the fact that, using the concepts of today’s science—which is limited to the sensory realm, the science that relies on the intellect and relies solely on sensory perception—one can, with these concepts, grasp only that which is transient. In nature, one can only grasp what leads to death, not what lives on. One cannot grasp the living. In culture, too, one can grasp only what dies; one cannot grasp what is nascent, what is growing. For this nascent, this growing must be grasped at least through imagination, at least through the first stage of higher knowledge, as described, for example, in the book *How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds?*. And in order to arrive at certain higher insights into what is becoming, one must be able to apply intuition and inspiration. If people approach things with the concepts they have used up to now, they can talk as much as they want, but they are speaking only of the administration of what is perishing, unless they are willing to engage with what can be perceived as “what is becoming” solely through supersensible knowledge. Things are indeed on a knife’s edge today. One cannot know anything about certain things and must descend into cultural chaos—in which we already live sufficiently—if one is unwilling to engage with the perception of the spiritual.

[ 9 ] What we need—and what spiritual science indeed strives for—is, in a sense appropriate to our times, a kind of renewal of the mystery tradition. To achieve this, however, it is necessary to understand the meaning of the ancient mystery tradition and, subsequently, to understand the significance of that period which was, in a sense, an intermediate stage between the ancient mysteries and those that must come as the new mystery tradition. All of this must be understood. The most surprising thing for the students of the ancient mysteries was, after all, that they were vividly shown how the old, atavistic clairvoyance—how the hidden knowledge—was doomed to decline. This could not be grasped through clairvoyant knowledge alone; to do so, one had to be initiated into the mysteries. People were shown that something other than the old clairvoyant gaze into the spiritual world must come to humanity. That this old aspect of the human soul—this manifestation of the vastness of the worlds in the imagination—was doomed to extinction was revealed to the students of the Mysteries. It was made clear to them in roughly the following way: What can be seen on Earth with the physical senses is not what contains the true mysteries of earthly existence. These true mysteries can only be revealed when, through clairvoyant contemplation, the human soul gains access to the mysteries of the cosmos, the mysteries of the extraterrestrial; when this soul comes to understand what is happening in the cosmos beyond Earth, in the extraterrestrial, non-terrestrial realm. For it was these things that were perceived in the clairvoyance of old, and not what took place on Earth. It was revealed to the students of the mysteries that such insight, such an ascent into the cosmos, would no longer be possible. And to those who were to penetrate the Christ Mystery, something else was revealed as well.

[ 10 ] The idea was roughly as follows. Even though the ancient, atavistic clairvoyants did not speak of the Christ—their inspirations came from the world in which the Christ has always existed, for the Christ is a cosmic being. Christ lives in all that is cosmic, in all that is universal in the world, from which flows what dawns upon human beings through atavistic clairvoyance. But from the time when the Mystery of Golgotha was to take place, this would no longer be accessible to human beings in the old way. — What happened? Well, Christ came down from this world; He came down from the cosmos to Earth. Because the cosmos was no longer accessible to human beings as it had been in ancient times, because they could no longer have found the Christ in the old way, because that form of knowledge and that state of soul—in which the world in which the Christ dwelt had once been perceived—had died out, the Christ had to come down to human beings. And he did come down. Therefore, everything that enlightened spirits had ever recognized about the spiritual world in ancient times—in pagan mystery cults and in pagan mystery science—had to be synthesized in the Christ. This had to be perceived in the Christ. One had to know which cosmic being had come down from the cosmos to Earth in the Christ. That is one thing.

[ 11 ] The other point was this: I said, “Of all that can be seen out there in the world—in natural phenomena, social institutions, and cultural institutions—the mind and the senses can perceive only the transitory; they can gain knowledge only of the transitory aspects of nature, which, after all, extend as far as the existence of Venus.” But in cultural knowledge, one is often already caught up in decline when one believes one has ideas that signify becoming. In what can be perceived by the senses and grasped by the intellect, there lies no seed for the future. In all of this lies that which is doomed to death. There would be only knowledge of death if that were all there were; for reality itself, which surrounds us, is doomed to death. Where, then, is anything enduring? Where, then, is that which, as the imperishable, will survive this outward existence that is doomed to death? Where, then, is that which will truly be preserved, while the atoms and forces—which physical superstition believes will be preserved—will not be preserved, but will perish?

[ 12 ] This exists only within human beings themselves. Of all beings—animals, plants, minerals, air, water, and everything that perishes—there is only one thing that endures beyond Earth’s evolution and beyond the evolution that will follow Earth’s existence: only that which lives within human beings themselves. Only human beings carry within themselves on Earth something that is enduring. One cannot speak of the preservation of atoms, matter, or energy; one can only speak of the preservation of something within human beings. But this can only be perceived through imagination, inspiration, and intuition. Everything else that is not perceived through supersensible knowledge is not enduring. The supersensible—for the sensible is all transitory—that which is enduring can therefore only be grasped through supersensible knowledge. Within the human being walking upon the Earth lies everything from all earthly existence that will be preserved beyond the Earth. When we ask: Where is the seed of something that grows beyond the Earth, Jupiter, and Venus evolutions, something that grows from the present culture into the culture of the future? — we must say: In nothing outside the Earth, only in what is within the human being. In that part of his being which is accessible only to supersensible knowledge, the human being is that which bears within itself the seed for the future. — And only the one who has the will to grasp the supersensible speaks correctly of the future; otherwise, everyone who speaks of the future speaks erroneously. That is why the Christ, who came down from the worlds that were becoming ever more inaccessible to human knowledge, had to descend for the sake of human knowledge as well; he had to unite with humanity, had to take up residence in Jesus, and thus become Christ Jesus—because only within a human body was that which holds the promise of the future for the Earth’s evolution. That is why we find in the Christ the cosmic, but that cosmic which, in ancient knowledge, could be grasped “directly”; and in Jesus, to whom the Christ came, we find that which henceforth bears the seed for the future solely within the human will. One does not understand the Christ if one seeks to understand him only as Christ or only as Jesus. One does not understand him if one speaks merely of the Christ; for the Christ of whom, for example, the ancient Docetists—a kind of Gnostics—spoke can no longer be grasped; that belongs to the old, atavistic clairvoyance. One does not understand Jesus if one refuses to acknowledge the Christ who has entered into Jesus. One does not understand that the cosmic must be saved for the future solely through the human seed on earth if one refuses to acknowledge the Christ in Jesus.

[ 13 ] Understanding the extent to which Christ Jesus is this dual being is a major undertaking. But at the same time, many have strived to create obstacles specifically to the understanding of Christ Jesus as a dual being. Thus, in more recent times, the aim has been to use a wide variety of means to make people forget that Christ dwelt within Jesus. On the one hand, there is that extreme theological doctrine which insists on speaking only of the “simple man from Nazareth”—that is, which speaks only of the human being of a sensory nature and not of the human being who carries within himself the seed of the future. Then there is that society founded to combat Christ and, to this end, to establish a false image of Jesus: the Society of Jesuitism, which essentially exists to expel the image of Christ from the image of Christ Jesus and to allow only Jesus, so to speak, to be regarded as the tyrant of evolving humanity. All of this must be viewed in context. For the various impulses to which this refers are at work in present-day life more than one might think; they are at work quite intensely in present-day life. And anyone who does not open their eyes and has no desire to understand the concrete manifestations of what is happening around them will never be able to do anything but be surprised by all that is to come; they will not gain much clarity about matters such as those indicated here. In many respects, our present age is, however, far too complacent to want to gain clarity on these matters. Spiritual scientific concepts are far too difficult. People therefore denounce them as amateurish, unscientific, fanciful, and the like. At the same time, for the reasons I have just cited, they condemn themselves to disregarding anything that might truly hold promise for the future. |

[ 14 ] And so we see this wasteland around us today, in the midst of the chaos into which the old religious creeds and cultural currents have led us. In the midst of this chaos—which people today, with a strange naivety, call “war,” even though it has long since ceased to be a war and has become something entirely different—in the midst of this chaos, we see a wasteland of thought and ideas, because only the comprehension of the supersensible, of the spiritual, can give rise to ideas and thoughts that are not barren, and because today human beings must decide whether to merely manage what is passing away, what is dying out, and become a disciple of Lenin—or to reckon with the supersensible, which contains what must come. I do not mean specifically this one Lenin, who is now wreaking havoc in Eastern Europe; I take him more as a symbol, for we have many, many such Lenins all around us in the entire sphere of contemporary life, in one field or another. It is simply that people do not want to approach anything other than that which is passing away.

[ 15 ] Please recall something I once pointed out here as well. The plant is alive, I said; you can describe it as a living being. But what does conventional science today describe about the plant? Not what lives within it, for that is supersensible; rather, it describes what fills the living being—that which within it is dead, that which is mineral. In today’s science, you will find nothing described other than what, as the mineral, fills living beings and what causes death within them. That is why, even today, we cannot rise to truly fruitful concepts of nature. Concepts such as those found in modern botany are not life-filled concepts; rather, they describe something that is filled with tiny stones, with minerals. The circulating mineral substance is present everywhere within them. This is also described in animals and in humans. As soon as one moves beyond this circulating mineral substance in plants, animals, and humans, they become something entirely different.

[ 16 ] Take, for example, Mr. von Uexküll, who wrote the essay “In the Struggle for the Animal Soul.” This Mr. von Uexküll is obsessed with masochistic cruelty when it comes to all aspects of the science of the soul—obsessed with anything that even remotely resembles the science of the soul. I said “masochistic cruelty” because the essay states: It should not be decided whether a soul exists or not; it should only be decided that science cannot determine anything about it. — Someone who is truly cruel also kills; someone who is masochistically cruel, like this Mr. von Uexküll, merely dabbles in killing, taunting here and there. This is, in fact, the very nature of today’s science; it’s just that people don’t notice it because they are reluctant to engage with it. They do not want to break through the barrier that separates them from their surroundings. Consequently, they are utterly unable to rise to the concepts they truly need so that humanity might once again learn to understand its environment.

[ 17 ] We know from spiritual science that the essential, the core of the human being descends from the spiritual worlds and unites with what surrounds the human being as a physical, material shell between birth and death or between conception and death. Today, people investigate the problems of conception, birth, and embryonic development, but they cannot truly investigate them, because they study only the dead matter embedded within the living. In this way, they will never come to understand the one thing that makes humanity comprehensible: When a human being descends from the spiritual world, they are conceived by a father and a mother, and then undergo the entire process of embryonic development. Today, science lives under the presumption that the father and mother give the child its existence. And since the father and mother are the center of the family, and the family is the foundation of social community, social communities—which are the extended family—also regard the human being as their property. This leads to very bitter concepts in the present day. — But that is not how it is.

[ 18 ] What, then, does the act of conception give to the human being? What does the human being gain from the act of conception? What the human being receives—as spiritual science can show—is the possibility of being a mortal being; through the act of conception, the human being receives the possibility of dying. Consider what is described in my various books: you will recognize that what I am saying now is the necessary sequence of events. The very moment a human being is conceived, that which makes his or her death possible here on Earth is incorporated into him or her. The entire life between birth and death is a development toward death, and death is instilled into what is received. What a human being is as a human, as a living being, is not in any way created at conception; rather, what is instilled into this otherwise immortal being is solely that which contains the possibility of dying. Parents can give the child only death—to put it in extreme terms—only the possibility of bearing a mortal body here on Earth. Whatever lives in this body must come through what descends from the spiritual world. The fact that this entire organism, this entire mechanism with which the human being is clothed and which he receives along with the seed of death through conception, is viable at all is due to what descends from the spiritual world. We must learn to reconnect human beings, in their most concrete form, to the development of the spiritual world. To do this, we will have to learn not to stand in that cowardly fear of knowledge in the face of the highest problems—as contemporary science does today—but to truly grapple with these highest problems. If we shrink back from them, then we cannot understand even what lives in our immediate surroundings.

[ 19 ] In the immediate vicinity—one might even say—a wide variety of peoples live today. Just think of the false concepts that Woodrow Wilson, for example, derived from the concept of “peoples” and the concept of “nation.” We have spoken about this often. One must be clear that one cannot understand this concept of “nation” without taking into account the entire evolution of the Earth. Where, then, does the division of humanity into nations come from?

[ 20 ] We know from spiritual science that evolution proceeded in such a way that we first had the Saturn incarnation of the Earth, followed by the Sun incarnation, then the Moon incarnation, and finally the present Earth state; next will come a Jupiter incarnation, and so on. However, this did not proceed so smoothly that an old Saturn body simply transformed into a solar, lunar, and terrestrial body; rather, there was first a separation of the Sun from the Earth, then a separation of the Moon from the Earth, so that we have a continuous evolution in which what has separated has reunited and separated again. Precisely what I referred to earlier as cosmic evolution—this process of separation—played a role in ancient clairvoyance. And in this clairvoyance, what is the human seed of the future remained entirely unconscious, remained “chthonic,” as it is called in ancient clairvoyance, within the ongoing evolution of the Earth. For what comes from the universe was, after all, destined to perish; it was preserved only because it was seized by the Luciferic force. Thus the various differentiations into nations and peoples were formed: coming from the cosmos; but the cosmic forces are imbued with Luciferic forces. Opposed to these variously differentiated peoples is what was also understood in a better time than the present: the universal human. This has an entirely different origin. It is that of which one can speak in the abstract, but of which one speaks in reality only when one truly grasps what lies within the human being as a seed of the future. In this there is nothing of nation, nothing of people; for it is that which did not come down from the cosmos, but rather that to which Christ went and with which he united himself. Christ did not unite Himself with any national entity, as the Jehovah deity still does, but He united Himself with the universal human. He was in the community of those gods from whom the nations arose, but He left that realm when it was ripe for decline, came to Earth, and took His place within the universal human. With regard to Christ Jesus, the greatest blasphemy is to use him for anything other than the universal human, where one says: “Not I, but Christ in me.”

[ 21 ] Understanding this is, in a sense, one of the most important concepts of the future. One of the most important insights into the future is to understand the relationship of Christ Jesus to humanity, and also to understand that everything merely “ethnic” lies outside the entire realm of Christ Jesus, because it is an old remnant of that which was actually ripe for destruction at the time of the Mystery of Golgotha. But all things remain in the world, even after the point at which they are ripe for decline, like withered fruit. Thus, of what was actually ripe for decline, nothing could remain but that science which, in its knowledge, seeks only to manage what is in decline; a science which, like contemporary natural or social science, deals only with ideas capable of managing what is in decline: either that which is in decline or dying in nature, or that which is passing away or dying in culture, as I have shown.

[ 22 ] In our cultural history, one can sometimes see this dying force—which seeks to live on in dead, abstract ideas and deludes itself into believing that they are somehow significant—clashing quite fiercely with the human seed, which alone holds the promise of the future and seeks to take root. I have often drawn attention to that significant conversation Goethe had with Schiller when the two were once at a meeting of the Natural History Society in Jena, where the botanist Batsch was giving a lecture on plants, and Schiller, upon leaving, said to Goethe: “The botanical perspective is, after all, something that fragments everything and drives out what unites.” — Goethe then sketched his “plant metamorphosis” for Schiller with a few characteristic strokes. Schiller replied, “But that is not experience; that is an idea.” — Schiller could not rise to the perspective of the forward-looking human being, who is then able to rediscover what holds promise for the future out there in the world—namely, the supersensible. Therefore, he replied to Goethe: “That is no experience, no observation; that is an idea.” — Goethe then said: “Then I see my ideas with my eyes.” — For him, what he sketched was something he also saw, something that was just as real to him as something perceived with “the physical senses.” There stood the one who, like Schiller, could not look up toward the supersensible, but had only the dead, abstract idea in mind, facing Goethe, who sought to draw out from what was recognized in nature that which is the promise of the future, the imperishable in humanity—in contrast to which all that is transitory is merely a parable that he wished to connect with the imperishable, and who was therefore not understood because he looked upon the supernatural and the imperishable just as he looked upon the sensible. Therefore, the necessary requirement for our time must be a more fully developed Goetheanism, one that has been further refined within its own field. And only then will it become clear, when people come to realize that such things as the individual denominations—including the Mosaic faith, and especially the Catholic Church—are merely continuations of the old, which should no longer exist, and thus intrude upon development like something withering, something that is established only through external force; and just as alongside this old, that which seeks from the outset to carry only the transitory into the future takes root. What expresses itself in this way—that it seeks only to carry the transitory—is Americanism. This is the basis of the kinship between Americanism and Jesuitism, of which I spoke last time.

[ 23 ] Goetheanism stands in contrast to all these things. By this, I do not mean something that can be dogmatically defined, but one must use names for something that goes far beyond the name itself. By “Goetheanism,” I do not mean what Goethe thought up until the year 1832, but rather something that may only be conceived in the spirit of Goethe in the next millennium—something that can emerge from Goethe’s worldview, from his imagination and sensibility. This explains why, precisely in everything connected in any way with Goetheanism, all that is stagnant sees its true enemy. In this realm, one experiences, I would say, the most profound cultural paradoxes. It is truly a kind of cultural paradox that the most spirited book about Goethe—despite everything that speaks against it—was written by a Jesuit: Father Baumgartner. It is a book that tears Goethe to shreds. It is, after all, precisely characteristic that everything that is in any way Jesuitical is opposed to Goethe. But this is a witty, profound book, not written in mere aphorisms; it does, after all, capture Goethe. — Whereas the book by the distinguished English gentleman Z. Lewes describes an 18th-century philistine who was born in Frankfurt am Main in 1749, went to Leipzig as a student, was then appointed to Weimar, and traveled to Italy—a man named Johann Wolfgang Goethe who is mistakenly admired. One does not write a book simply by putting “Johann Wolfgang Goethe” on the cover while, for the rest, describing an 18th-century philistine. A cultural paradox lies at the heart of the Jesuit book on Goethe, because it once again reveals how the conflicts of power play out in modern times—where the true conflicts of power actually lie.

[ 24 ] On a smaller scale, this is evident here as well. As long as we could be regarded as a “hidden sect,” anthroposophy was rarely attacked. Now that it has spread somewhat, we are already seeing the most furious attacks—for example, particularly from the Jesuit side—and the issues of the journal *Stimmen aus Maria Laach* (now *Stimmen der Zeit*) no longer content themselves with a single article; they devote entire issues to what I call “anthroposophy.” Therefore, I must urge you again and again to remember, when attacks come from this side, not to believe that—from those people’s point of view—it would be for our own good if they were to say: “We are, after all, speaking of Christ; we are promoting an understanding of Christ,” and so on. These very people forbid that! That is precisely what one must not do. One must not make any claims about the Christ unless they are part of the Church’s doctrine. Therefore, let us no longer be so naive in our circles as to believe that simply by being a good Christian, one can reconcile Catholicism. Precisely by being a good Christian—by doing everything to promote Christianity—one makes Catholicism one’s greatest enemy; indeed, it is absolutely necessary—and will become ever more so—to ensure that naivety regarding the realities that surround us disappears from our circles. In our circles, there must be more and more room for the desire to see what forces—both those in decline and those on the rise—are actually at work in our surroundings. We must move beyond this longing, so often found among us, to strive merely for a little imaginative world. I have often said that we must move beyond this striving for a little imaginative world. We must be able to integrate our spiritual science everywhere into the cultural concepts of the present and become keen observers of what is alive in the present, for only from the standpoint of this spiritual science can the present truly be observed. How many come to me and say: “I have seen this and that.” Well, yes, they did see that. Imaginary visions are not so far removed from human development. “Was that the Keeper of the Threshold?” — some then ask. But the answers to such questions are not as simple as “yes” or “no,” for the answers encompass the entirety of human development. Yet the answers have been given. I am now revising my *Secret Science*, which is to be published in a new edition. I see that it actually contains everything needed to answer such questions. All the precautions and limitations one should impose on oneself are described in detail there. The feelings and sensations one should develop are described there. And it is clearly pointed out—one just has to read carefully throughout. If I had been to present in full detail everything contained in *The Secret Science*, I would have had to write thirty volumes. One must think for oneself when reading this book; one must draw conclusions—but these conclusions can indeed be drawn. I do not like to write thick books, but it is clear: Certainly, whoever strives toward the supersensible world strives to encounter the Keeper of the Threshold; but encountering this Keeper of the Threshold is not as simple a matter as having a dreamlike imagination. After all, the easiest way to enter the supersensible world is through a dreamlike imagination. The encounter with the Keeper of the Threshold is a tragedy, a life-and-death struggle concerning all concepts of knowledge, all laws of knowledge, and all connections between human beings and the spiritual world—with Ahriman and Lucifer. This life catastrophe must occur if one wishes to encounter the Guardian of the Threshold. If he merely appears before a person in dreamlike imagination, it means that someone wants to slip past him conveniently in order to have—as a substitute—the dream of the Guardian of the Threshold.

[ 25 ] One must think clearly about these things. Then it will become clear that this clear thinking is the foundation for healing all superstition and everything of which the frivolous opponents accuse spiritual science. Moreover, this way of thinking—this soaring toward the experience of the spiritual—contains all the seeds one needs to truly emerge from the current global catastrophe. What leads out of it must be grasped not on Earth, not in the sensory realm alone, not in the institutions that are, after all, running themselves into the ground and through which what already exists is being overexploited. It must be grasped—that which is not yet there! We must be seized with burning zeal to grasp that which is not yet there. But that which is not yet there can only be grasped according to the pattern of that which is grasped through supersensible knowledge. Looking back into the past is not enough. The Kautskys prefer to look back at the past and base their understanding of humanity on anthropology. They want to study conditions from a time when humanity had barely come into being in order to understand the social conditions of the present. These true sons of a misunderstood Catholicism—such as Kant, for example—want it this way. But one cannot look back into the past, for what extends all the way to the very recent present was created by atavistic forces, instinctively. In the future, nothing will be done instinctively anymore. And if humanity seeks only to manage what remains from its instinctual era, it will never arrive at that which holds promise for the future—that which leads beyond this catastrophe. What constitutes, solely and exclusively, an active, serious understanding of the present is already connected to the correct attitude toward the spiritual world.

[ 26 ] I would have much to say if, continuing in this vein, I were to speak to you—based on our premises—about various matters that are currently at hand. However, if during the weeks when we will once again be apart, you truly take to heart what has been said in these reflections—and what should culminate in the necessity of recognizing the dual nature of Christ Jesus—then this summer, through meditation, you will make great strides in understanding the cosmic Christ and the earthly Jesus: that the cosmic Christ descended from the spiritual worlds because these worlds were henceforth to be closed to human perception, and because human beings are to comprehend what lies within themselves as a seed of the future. In this cosmic Christ and in the earthly, in the humanistic Jesus and in their synthesis lies much of the solution to the riddle of the worlds, at least to the riddle of humanity. The seed for the future lies within the human being. But this seed must be fertilized by Christ Jesus. If it is not fertilized, it will take on an Ahrimanic form, and the Earth will head toward a chaotic destiny. In short, in connection with the mystery of Christ Jesus, you will find the solutions to many, many questions of the present. But you must strive to seek these solutions in such a way that you do not casually settle for what is so often regarded as theosophy or mysticism or the like—a “union with the spiritual,” or a “complete merging with the universe,” but rather that you truly observe the real circumstances surrounding us and strive to penetrate them with what you gain from spiritual science. You will increasingly find yourselves saying, after resolving many questions: “Truly, it is not theory but something very practical that humanity seeks today.” — It will find itself at a dead end, will admit to itself that it can go no further unless it is willing to move forward with the Spirit. Everything that refuses to journey with the Spirit will prove to be withering away.

[ 27 ] Whether we choose to journey with the Spirit is a crucial question for the future of humanity. Today I would like to impress this particularly deeply upon your hearts—a feeling that can arise from the reflections we have just shared. And it is indeed likely that today was the last time we were gathered here in this room, which we have grown to love over the years for our reflections. We were among the first to furnish this room according to our own taste, and of course one can only do so much within the limits of what is available. We furnished it because we have always held the conviction that our spiritual scientific endeavors should not be merely theoretical, but should find expression in everything in which we encounter one another as human beings. It is now being taken from us. We must find another. Of course, we will not be able to furnish this other space in the present time in the same way as this one; we will have to make do with the other one. We have grown fond of this room because we cannot believe that one can speak of what we call the connection with the spiritual in the same way everywhere as here, where we have tried so many different things—things that have, of course, been tried on a larger scale in Dornach. We’ve had to try various things in the past. Perhaps there are still some here who were present when we had to speak about our subjects in a pub: I stood there, with the audience in front of me, while behind me the landlord or landlady filled the beer mugs. Another time we were in a stable-like room; another one had actually been set aside for us, but we were given only this one. In other cities, I have also given lectures in pubs where there wasn’t even a complete floor, and we had to put up with that as well. But that is not really what can be expected from the very nature of our cause, and someone would misunderstand us if they were to say that one could speak lovingly about spiritual matters in the same way in every setting. The spirit exists to penetrate matter and permeate it everywhere. That is also the meaning with regard to social and scientific life, as I have indicated today.

[ 28 ] Given all of this—and of course you will all come to realize when this is your last time here—it will certainly be extremely difficult for us to part from this space after a few weeks, a space that was lovingly furnished back then with the help of our anthroposophical friends. But even such a parting must nevertheless be taken in the right way, in our view, as a symbol. People will have to part with many things over the course of the coming decades. They will be surprised by this as well; people do not believe it. But one thing should be certain for those who have truly grasped the innermost impulse of spiritual science: Whatever may waver, this one thing cannot waver: what we have grasped in the spirit, and what we have resolved to carry out in the spirit. What we will do out of the spirit—no matter how it may appear amid the chaotic phenomena—will prove to be the right thing.

[ 29 ] So leaving this room may serve as a symbol for us. We must enter another one. But we carry with us that which we know is not merely our deepest inner being, but the deepest inner being of the world—upon which humanity must build if it is to build correctly. The spiritual scientist is convinced—he knows this, and he holds fast to it—that no one can take away from us what we have gained through spiritual science, that no one can take this away from humanity either, and that it must lead human relationships toward healing. Perhaps there are many things about which we do not yet know how we will proceed, but we will do them correctly in the spirit of spiritual science. We can be convinced of this if we imbue ourselves with the realization of what Goetheanism specifically means for spiritual science, and if, on the other hand, we take to heart what was recently mentioned here—that the world denounces and vilifies precisely that which is connected with Central European culture of the 18th and early 19th centuries, and that, when we bring all this to mind, we can nevertheless stand firm: Whatever may happen, this Central European culture will bear fruit for the future of humanity. The future of humanity already rests upon it. And precisely because they do not want this future for humanity—in order to save themselves from it—the opponents of this Central European culture slander it. But if we grasp this Central European culture in spirit, recognize its spiritual essence, and know that we can build upon it, then we can also know this: Even if all the devils had sworn to bring about its downfall, it will not perish! But only that which is connected to the true spirit will not perish.