The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Fourth Lecture

[ 1 ] What is currently causing concern for those who wish to work in the field of anthroposophically oriented spiritual science—as discussed here—is a fact that has, in fact, been discussed here on several occasions. I am referring to the fact that, fundamentally, a large portion of humanity today remains oblivious to all that is clearly manifesting itself in the form of forces of decline—forces that, if allowed to take effect in the manner appropriate to them, are bound to lead our present civilization to the abyss.

[ 2 ] Must we not admit that, in the present, much is welling up from deep within the human psyche and manifesting itself as this or that event—that, in other words, quite a lot is actually happening right now—and that, on the other hand, a large portion of our contemporaries simply cannot bring themselves to pay due attention to what is actually taking place?

[ 3 ] It can be said that, from a broad perspective and with genuine attention to the forces shaping the world, only a few spiritual movements are currently active. One such intellectual movement is the one I have frequently described over the years—one that has its roots specifically in the English-speaking population of the world, that operates very much in secret, but that is extraordinarily effective. The second is the movement that brings together all those who today seek to capitalize on the—admittedly quite understandable and justified—instincts of the broad masses of humanity. It is a movement represented in its extremes by people who understand nothing of human development, who know nothing of what can move the world forward, but who, due to certain circumstances to which I shall yet allude, are able to secure a position of authority despite their narrow-mindedness, despite their—in fact, quite extensive—criminal tendencies, even if they are intelligent people and, by impressing many others, are able to rise to the surface of today’s public life.

[ 4 ] The third influential intellectual movement is the one that emerges from individual, particularly energetic representatives of various denominations—denominations of all kinds—who also know exactly what they actually want. They embody everything that is commonly referred to as “Jesuitism.” And yet, although many people speak of Jesuitism and the like, a large number of our contemporaries are still reluctant to pay close attention to what is actually happening there.

[ 5 ] If one wishes to form an opinion about the course of current events, various factors must be taken into account. One factor, however, stands out above all others; it is connected to a fact I already mentioned in my first public lecture here—namely, that with regard to their inner psychological constitution, particularly with regard to their structure of imagination, people today continue to a great extent what was appropriate only for the structure and form of imagination during the Middle Ages. This was great and significant back then, but it is now outdated. Those who have most intensely appropriated the entire way of feeling and imagining in its medieval forms are today the broad circles of more or less socialist people throughout the world. Within these circles, forms of thought have taken shape that find their expression, in particular, in an almost boundless belief in authority and in a submissive attitude toward anything that simply asserts itself through the firm hand of authority within these circles. It is only through this that it has become possible for men such as Lenin and Trotsky, in Eastern Europe—and the movement is spreading toward Asia at breakneck speed—to exercise, with the help of a few thousand people, a tyranny over millions of people, a tyranny that was never as great, even during the worst times of Eastern tyranny, as it is today.

[ 6 ] All these factors must be taken into account when trying to form a judgment today about what is happening. For what can now be characterized in just a few strokes is, in essence, pitted against—even when taking into account the great forces of world history and world-shaping—that which should be an honest, sincere, and true spiritual scientific movement. And if one compares the interest that such a spiritual-scientific movement has garnered with the interest that the other movements described have garnered over a relatively short period of time—namely, with the influence these movements have gained—one must say that interest in this spiritual-scientific movement is still virtually zero today.

[ 7 ] Certainly, we do not wish to overlook the fact that there are indeed numerous people who support this spiritual scientific movement—or who, at least, tell themselves that they do. But the difference would be enormous if one were to consider the intensity with which the three other characterized spiritual movements advocate for what they seek to bring to the surface, and the intensity of interest shown toward the spiritual science movement. For this spiritual scientific movement is, after all, understood in an extraordinarily superficial way—superficial in sensation and emotion—while the other movements are grasped with boundless intensity precisely through sensation and emotion.

[ 8 ] Who, after all, truly realizes—to the point of placing it at the center of their entire sensibility and thinking—that a serious intervention by spiritual science into the forces shaping the world involves bringing to prominence and recognition among human beings what, from our perspective, is called the science of initiation? The science of initiation encompasses humanity’s most serious interest today. The interest shown in it by many who believe they are honestly committed to it is, after all, a rather superficial one, shaped by all sorts of secondary considerations.

[ 9 ] Those whom I have often referred to as the true architects of the Anglo-American world movement possess a science of initiation, albeit in a manner that is by no means beneficial to humanity. Initiatory science encompasses everything that is dependent on Jesuitism. And Leninism, too, possesses a peculiar form of initiatory science. For there is a very specific reason why Leninism knows how to express itself so cleverly through the intellectual forms of the mind. In Leninism, the cunning of the human animal—the cunning of human animality—works its way to the surface of human development. Everything that flows from human instincts and human selfishness takes on interpretations and forms in what emerges in Leninism and Trotskyism in a manner that appears so clever on the surface. The animal seeks to work its way to the surface as the most intelligent of all animals and aims to transform all Ahrimanic forces—which seek to exclude what is human, specifically human—and all the cleverness found throughout the animal kingdom—as I have often emphasized—into forces that shape humanity.

[ 10 ] Just think about it—as I’ve often emphasized here—how conceited people became once they had invented something like linen-rags paper or wood pulp paper or something similar—paper itself, in fact. Yes, how much earlier than humans did wasps or similar animals—which build their nests from the same materials as paper—make this invention! There, human intelligence is present within the animal kingdom. And if you take into account all the intelligence of this kind that is widespread in the animal kingdom, and if you consider that the Ahrimanic forces absorb this in order to draw it up into the human minds of those who are guided solely by selfish instincts, then you will understand that there may be some truth in the statement that Lenin, Trotsky, and similar people are the instruments of these Ahrimanic forces. This is an Ahrimanic initiation that simply belongs to a different sphere of existence than our own. But it is an initiation that holds within its bosom the power to wipe human civilization off the face of the earth—to wipe everything that has developed as human civilization off the face of the earth.

[ 11 ] There are three lines of initiation: two that lie on the plane of human evolution, and one that lies below the plane of human evolution but possesses an immensely strong will—an almost boundless will. And the only thing that can bring order and a goal worthy of humanity to this entire direction is that which lies within true spiritual science. But a true goal, a genuine seriousness, can only arise from this spiritual science if one truly makes it a profound part of one’s life and if one is attentive to how much idle chatter, how much pride, and how much spiritual selfishness are often expressed in what—mostly quite honestly—is associated with this spiritual science movement. It does no good to gloss over these things. On the contrary, they must be discussed again and again. For how else could one hope today to instill in people’s souls those forces that are necessary if civilization is not to head toward its decline!

[ 12 ] I’d like to spend a few minutes describing something very vividly. Just a short while ago, I read the following sentence in a newspaper: “Religion, which represents a fantastical reflection in people’s minds of their relationships with one another and with nature, is doomed to natural extinction due to the growth and triumph of the scientific, clear, naturalistic conception of reality, which will develop in parallel with the systematic construction of the new society.”

[ 13 ] Well, based on what we can learn today about the “sleeping souls” of the present, one might well ask: How many people read this in a newspaper article and recoil as if stung by a viper, because it is the most terrible symptom that can be expressed in such sentences? For one does not consider what will come to pass on Earth if what is implied in the words “Religion, which represents a fantastical reflection in people’s minds of their relationships with one another and with nature, is doomed to natural extinction through the growth and triumph of the scientific, clear, naturalistic conception of reality, which will develop in parallel with the systematic construction of the new society” is actually realized. ”

[ 14 ] What is meant here by “religion” is not just any creed, is not just any religious creed that is justifiably open to criticism, is not merely religion in the narrow sense—it is all morality. And what would follow if what is contained in these sentences were to come true is that human society across the entire earth would have to transform itself into a herd of animals capable only of sophisticated thought. Unless a way can be found for counterforces to arise against what is now growing in Eastern Europe and spreading across to Asia at breakneck speed, then all of civilization is doomed. Then such ideals would become reality.

[ 15 ] I do not believe it is justified, in the face of such world-historical impulses, for people to emerge here and there who wish that the often-repeated mystical chatter within the innermost circles—which, contrary to my intention, has already existed for a long time within anthroposophically oriented spiritual science and has been regarded here and there as an ideal—should be continued in any way, without regard for what the great interests of humanity on Earth demand of us. We must have the will to look into these great interests of humanity without prejudice. We must bring ourselves—not merely theoretically or intellectually, but instinctively—to take certain fundamental teachings very seriously, teachings that are obscured by all European and American creeds and which some still seek to obscure further.

[ 16 ] We know, of course, what kind of smear campaign is now being waged against anthroposophically oriented spiritual science, how it’s coming at us from all sides. It would be a shame if we were to repeatedly succumb to the harmful—and, in fact, already punishable—illusion that we could ever hope to achieve anything in this or that corner where we face opposition by converting this or that person who is officially bound to uphold this or that old way of thinking. We cannot and must not be compromisers or opportunists. We should, so to speak, keep this before our eyes every morning as our special meditation. There have been well-meaning people who have said that we should simply explain to people in this or that direction how we are trying to bring the mystery of Christ into the world. The more we do this, the more criticism comes from certain quarters. For nothing is more repugnant to certain Catholic or Protestant denominations today, for example, than the establishment of a true understanding of the mystery of Christ among humanity. For they have no interest in the true mystery of Christ taking hold, but rather in clinging to the old ways. If we had some convoluted creed about Christ, we would be treated as a harmless sect, as mavericks, and would not be fought with the intensity with which we are currently being fought. But because there are enough people within the two camps—aside from the third—who know that, based on the truth, we must one day speak about the mystery of Christ and about the social order based on the threefold social order, they prick up their ears and then say: “We would indeed be cut off at the roots if we were to accommodate the truth; therefore, we must vow to destroy it!” — We are not being opposed because of an error, but because certain quarters realize that we seek the truth. It is of no use today to speak of certain things that are happening in any other way than in this sense. For the spiritual movement referred to here has the greatest interest in absolute clarity, particularly in clarity of thought.

[ 17 ] For remember some of the things I have explained! What, after all, is essential when it comes to understanding what humanity needs most of all today? What matters is that our powers of thought—everything we carry within us as powers of imagination, apart from the sensory faculties—that these actual powers of thought are a legacy of our existence before our birth, or rather before our conception. What we as human beings are capable of thinking, we bring with us into the physical world through our birth from our pre-birth existence. Everything we develop within ourselves as thoughts while we are in the physical body consists of the forces that govern our entire human being between our last death and the birth through which we entered this earthly life. Now we think, and what we expend as powers of thought—not as thoughts themselves—is the shadow of what was active before our birth or conception. |

[ 18 ] Think for a moment about what we today call the forces of nature—about what is at work in lightning and thunder, in the movement of waves, in the formation of clouds, in sunrise and sunset, in wind and weather, in the emergence of plants from the earth, in their conception, birth, and growth of animals—think of everything you perceive as forces of nature all around you, and think not of their real form, but of their mere image. So please, imagine that everything you perceive as forces of nature around you casts its image, its shadow, somewhere, and that these shadows are collected in a container and act as images. A similar relationship exists between present-day natural reality and the reality underlying it, just as there is between your pre-birth existence and your powers of thought in this earthly life. Just imagine for a moment that everything I am trying to outline schematically—what happens to your soul between death and a new birth—forms a shadow; a shadow forms from everything that is there, and this shadow becomes the content of your mind, the content of your thoughts; it is your power of thought. What you are thinking now are the active forces from before your birth. That is nature in the spiritual world, if I may use that paradoxical expression. Human evolution cannot proceed any further unless people become aware of this: through my thinking, my pre-birth existence plays a role in my powers of thought. By entering this earthly life through birth, and by thinking, I am the continuation of my pre-birth existence.

[ 19 ] If one accepts this, to whom does it seem most objectionable? It is most repugnant to those creeds that say something like this: A human being is born. If two people here—a male and a female—choose to have sexual intercourse, then God creates a soul in the spiritual world so that it can be united with what is produced here by two people having sexual intercourse. This is how a human being comes into being! — That certainly contradicts what has just been said! But the creeds of today’s civilized world thrive on this very idea. They all teach: When two people have sexual intercourse here, the Spirit does them the favor of creating a soul up above, brand-new; this soul is then sent down so that it can unite with the physical body that has been formed, and then something new has come into being. — But to whom are all these creeds speaking? They are speaking to terribly selfish people who, above all, cannot bear the thought of annihilation after death. Yet they can bear that other thought, for they have been accustomed to it for centuries, even millennia: that it pleases God to create souls for the human children who are conceived here. But the idea that everything ends with death—out of their selfishness, they cannot bear this thought.

[ 20 ] Of course, you all know—I need not dwell on this—what life is like for people after death, but we are turning our attention to an entirely different perspective. Preachers everywhere must assume that they are speaking to people who cannot bear the thought of annihilation after death. They must pour out from the pulpit—regardless of the denomination of the people sitting below—words that make it “clear” to them—that is, unclear—what happens after death. They must choose precisely those words that most strongly stir people’s selfishness; they must utter precisely those sentences that particularly cater to this spiritual selfishness of human beings.

[ 21 ] What would happen—I’ll explain this to you using a specific example—if, for instance, someone today were to take a completely unbiased and serious look at certain aspects of the Catholic creed, say, the dogma that states that it must please God, when two people unite in marriage, to send them a soul that has been made anew. If this aspect of the creed were taken to task, what would happen? — Anyone who set out without prejudice to examine the whole matter would find that such a thing has not the slightest connection with the tenets of true Christianity, but that in the Middle Ages Aristotle’s teachings had found their way into Christian theology, and that Aristotle, drawing on a misunderstood form of Platonism, advocated the doctrine that every time a human body is newly created, a fresh soul is also created and unites with it. What appears as a self-evident premise in the Christian creeds has nothing to do with Christianity; it is an Aristotelian view.

[ 22 ] And furthermore, let’s consider something else: Among the various creeds, we find the doctrine of the eternity of hellish punishments. Yet another purely Aristotelian view! Aristotle assumed, in fact, that if the soul is created, lives here until death, and then enters the spiritual world, then in this spiritual world—as he imagines it—it has nothing else to do but look back for all eternity on what it did here during its single earthly life. So Aristotle imagines that a new soul is created for every child born, that this soul lives on Earth until death, and then, for all eternity, is occupied with looking back on what happened during that one earthly life. If someone has murdered another, they must look back on that forever. That is the origin of the doctrine of hellish punishment. It is a purely Aristotelian doctrine.

[ 23 ] Just imagine: if the truth were to take the place of the Aristotelianism that is passed off as the essence of Christianity, then those who have sought to promote this Aristotelianism—masquerading as Christianity—would be utterly terrified that people would see through it, that they would discover: Our preachers, our pastors—they are not preaching Christianity to us from the pulpit at all, but rather an Aristotelianism that has crept its way into Christianity!

[ 24 ] Likewise, there is an infinite amount of Gnosticism in Christianity. Likewise, there is an infinite amount of Egyptian mysteries in the Catholic Mass. Numerous Catholic liturgical practices—and even many aspects of the Protestant creed—contain elements whose origins must be sought in various Eastern religions. All these people want is for people not to get to the bottom of things, for no one to figure out where these things actually come from. So what must be done? One must slander! One must claim that those who speak the truth today are borrowing from and plagiarizing Orientalism, Gnosticism, and so on. One must engage in “Traubism.” One must resort to scholarly slander in the same way as Pastor and Professor Traub and all those who have now become his followers. Why do people do this? Because the truth is coming to light, and because they have every interest in preventing the truth from coming to light. Time and again, people will come forward and say: “What you are doing here is borrowed from this or that”—and in doing so will provoke a reaction that turns people against Gnosis and everything they carry within their own spiritual being, yet which they do not want to reveal in its true form. Gnosis—one must say—is something terrible, something hideous! — Then people will not concern themselves with Gnosis because they fear it, and then the pastors can speak about what actually stems from Gnosis. For it is the pastors who speak about something that stems from Gnosis, not those who speak about what grows out of anthroposophically oriented spiritual science. And what is feared most of all is that the soul’s pre-existence—that the soul’s life before birth or before conception—that this rooting of the soul in the spiritual world has existed throughout all the ages that any scientific creed of humanity can even contemplate. For if one were to come to recognize the truth, there would no longer be room in the minds of rationally thinking people for the blasphemy that the gods are obligated to send down a freshly created soul from the spiritual world to unite with every single human body. But all these things ultimately stem from the forceful assertion of the idea of power. Behind all of this lies the idea of power. And simply by following certain teachings, one can imbue the idea of power with immense strength. |

[ 25 ] What is happening right now in Dornach, for example? All around, almost everywhere in Switzerland, articles are appearing about anthroposophy that do not actually contain a single true statement. The whole campaign began with the publication of an article containing twenty-three lies. For weeks now, these twenty-three lies have been followed by a steady stream of articles that have spread throughout almost the entire Catholic press in Switzerland, and none of them contain a single true statement. Why is this happening? It is happening because the large following of these people is being led into a certain state of mind when they are told untruths—a state of mind in which one can no longer distinguish truth from untruth.

[ 26 ] Just consider all the effort that goes into our anthroposophically oriented spiritual science to develop sufficiently clear concepts of the extent to which, for example, what appears in human consciousness in the form of dreams may or may not be a reflection of the truth. Without further ado, a person cannot distinguish between what is false and what is true when presented with it in a dream. — A community is placed in the same state when it is fed lies, especially when one knows that this community believes the falsehoods. For by inducing the soul’s state into the mood evoked by the falsehood, one has turned it into a compliant tool of the will to power. Those who can best exercise power over humanity are those who instill illusions in people in a way that makes them unrecognizable. Thus, these false articles are written quite systematically with the intention of creating the very mood that can be achieved through the lie. This is the inevitable conclusion of probabilism, which has, after all, long been taught by the Jesuits. This is merely the final offshoot.

[ 27 ] It is, after all, difficult to appeal to such people, who are, for the most part, the dormant souls of the present. — We were compelled to organize a lecture the day before I left, because one must, of course, fight—even if one does not want to—against what is being presented as a lie in Dornach. And Dr. Boos, who is one of our bravest younger fighters, then—after he had, during the discussion (the lecture was open to the public), called on anyone who wished to speak regarding what had been said, and after everyone had remained silent—declared before the entire audience, he declared publicly that the primary author of the twenty-three lies, Pastor Arnet of Reinach, was unworthy to exercise his priestly office and that he was a spiritual poisoner.

[ 28 ] There’s nothing you can do about it. And then, even though they’re told this, people have only one—I’d almost say, a teacher whose knees are shaking—who then steps forward and says: Just wait and see, not all the articles have been published yet; it will all come out in the end—well, I could say nothing else but: The beginning consisted of twenty-three lies, and even if the end does not come until the end of the world, the truth of those twenty-three lies will certainly not come to light, no matter how long that end may be delayed. For in what has been published so far—and a considerable number of articles have already appeared—not the slightest attempt has been made to address the twenty-three lies.

[ 29 ] But other examples have been cited based on a peculiar logic. In particular, the pamphlet by the Tübingen speaker was brought up—it plays a major role—but the people who cite Professor Traub’s pamphlet in these articles do not understand it correctly. They write: “Steiner borrows all sorts of things from ancient writings, the Upanishads, the Egyptian Isis Mysteries, and the ‘Akashic Records’”—well, perhaps the typesetter simply wrote it that way, but perhaps the clergyman did as well. So then I said that it really wasn’t my concern to correct typographical errors, but that it would be a rather peculiar reader of Traub’s pamphlet who immediately forgot that, after all, not even Traub himself claimed the nonsense that the Akashic Records were something you’d find on library shelves, and that you can’t exactly accuse someone of borrowing anthroposophically oriented spiritual science from that old tome, the Akashic Records.

[ 30 ] We have now, after all, lost some friends among the liberals as a result of these attacks. For example, Dr. Boos, in a liberal newspaper, immediately brought out the heavy artillery, saying: “This is a deliberate falsehood. For whoever wrote this must surely know that he does not have a copy of the Akashic Records in his library. He cannot have it in his library, so he must know this; therefore, he must be writing a deliberate falsehood.” But what does the person in question do? He says: Dr. Boos is beating around the bush, because it goes without saying that it was not he, but the typesetter, who caused the typographical error “Akaska Chronicle.” And when someone engages in such sophistry as to accuse you of such a typographical error, it shows what kind of person he really is.

[ 31 ] Well, you can see what kind of mindset we’re dealing with here. But don’t underestimate this mindset! Be aware that it will be a tough battle, one that is increasingly shifting in this direction. They want to prevent people from learning what I first spoke about in the course for doctors. I said there: Precisely when one undertakes a serious effort to come to know the spiritual laws of the world from within present-day life—when one tries to come to know the deeper mysteries of human nature, that is, when one appropriates these things for oneself from present-day life and then rediscovers them in the ancient writings, even if from an instinctive, atavistic spiritual life— then one feels a great humility before the grandeur of an instinctive, atavistic way of thinking that humanity once possessed, that was lost, and that must be rediscovered today. — So speaks the one who is aware that what must be sought today through knowledge drawn from life was once present in humanity as instinctive wisdom. Of course, much of what was known from the ancient instinctive wisdom has passed into the creeds, which have only corrupted it. These creeds, however, seek to instill fear in humanity regarding this primordial wisdom, and when they speak of it, they do so in this vein: “Those terrible people who practice anthroposophy today borrow everything from this primordial wisdom.” — If one were to get to the bottom of the matter, one would see how vastly different what is presented to people today as anthroposophically oriented spiritual science is from anything that has ever been borrowed from anywhere—be it the Upanishads or whatever else. — One simply has to draw from the Akashic Records, this “old tome”! And those who are now voicing opposition from all corners want to ensure that people fail to see that something is emerging that belongs in the present.

[ 32 ] Therefore, be clear about one thing whenever you are tempted to praise certain echoes here and there: The alliance between Jesuitism and social democracy, which is now growing ever closer, is entirely natural; there is nothing unnatural about it. For the Social Democrats, by turning the matter on its head, are endowed—albeit from the opposite side—with the very same patterns of thought as the Jesuits. But what differs so greatly from all other sentiments is the “eternity of man,” which has become a doctrine of egoism. It reveals its true form by once again making the pre-existence of the human soul—which exists before birth or conception—an effective moral agent. This view will be fought tooth and nail. And we will only be able to make progress in the world if, first, the truth possesses an inner power; but this inner power can only take effect if, second, there are people—no matter how few in number—who have the courage to carry this truth in their souls, to carry it seriously, sincerely, honestly, and without compromise. It is of no use for us to blur the enormous difference that exists between Catholic and Protestant Aristotelianism—which holds that the soul creates a human body—and true Christianity. We must not blur this difference. For if we blur this difference, we will not even realize where the sources of the idea of power and the consciousness of power actually lie.

[ 33 ] I must repeatedly point out that pastoral letter from a Catholic bishop, which actually exists and which states: The faithful have a duty to regard the priest as a being higher than God and Christ, because every time the priest performs the consecration at the altar, Christ is compelled to be present at the altar, to be present with his body and blood in the bread and wine. Since the priest compels God to be present at the altar, the priest has greater power in the universe than God. — That is the content of a pastoral letter that actually exists and which, incidentally, has been incorporated into many other pastoral letters. And if you ask me: Is this consistent with the spirit of that creed which, in 869 at the Council of Constantinople, abolished the Holy Spirit? — then I say to you: Yes. — For whoever says there that God is more powerful than the priest says so—if he says it as a Catholic—because people today simply do not want to accept the alternative. But just as people today are sufficiently asleep in their souls not to ask themselves: What is the author of the letter actually saying, when a figure who wrote to Moleschott was courageous enough to say that the criminal, the liar, the murderer is morally right only if he can live out the full range of his inclinations, and is immoral if he does not express these inclinations that are inherent in him—for by doing so he would limit his personality—and that the murderous inclinations are just as justified as the other inclinations? People today are simply not brave enough to admit to themselves: If our natural scientists continue to teach what they teach now as the foundation for a worldview, then the necessary consequence must simply be stated: The criminal, the murderer, is just as worthy as the other person who strives, so to speak, to be moral; people are simply too cowardly to admit this to themselves. In the era when materialism was at its height—when writers like Vogt, Moleschott, and Büchner, who were courageous spirits, were active—such confessions were made. But the present is too cowardly to make this confession. Likewise, in the slumbering souls of the present, there is not enough courage to admit: Yes, according to the spirit embodied in those confessions, the priest is more powerful than God.

[ 34 ] The point is precisely that the worldview known as anthroposophically oriented spiritual science is in fact dependent on creating clarity of thought in all directions. For what it has to say cannot be grasped with unclear thoughts, cannot be grasped with rambling, sulphurous mysticism, but can be grasped only with crystalline thoughts—thoughts such as those I attempted to identify in The Philosophy of Freedom as the starting point for true human freedom.

[ 35 ] We can certainly discuss such matters further when I am in a position to present to you again, which, I hope, will be very soon.