The Rudolf Steiner Archive

World Pentecost: The Message of Anthroposophy

[ 1 ] When we look back at the history of human development, we see events—both major and minor—that have shaped the life of all humanity. The greatest of all these events is what we call the Mystery of Golgotha, through which Christianity has intervened in human development. This Mystery of Golgotha was understood quite differently at the time it occurred than in later periods, and in our own time it must once again be understood and grasped anew. It is the task of anthroposophy to understand this Mystery of Golgotha correctly in the context of our time.

[ 2 ] We must transport ourselves back to earlier times, when people had a consciousness quite different from what it is today. If we go back three or four millennia, people had an instinctive awareness that, before they descended to Earth into a physical body, they had lived in the spiritual world. Back then, every person knew that there was a soul-spiritual being within them that had been sent down into earthly existence by the divine powers.

[ 3 ] People back then also had a different understanding of death, for, since they could look back in their memories on their spiritual and soul life before their earthly existence, they knew that what they had lived before their earthly life also lives on beyond death.

[ 4 ] Back then, there were schools that were also religious institutions; they were called “mysteries.” In these schools and religious institutions, people were taught what they could know about life before they descended to Earth. And through this, people came to understand that before their earthly existence, they had lived among the stars and spiritual beings just as they live on Earth among plants, animals, mountains, and rivers.

[ 5 ] Human beings told themselves: “I have descended from the world of the stars to earthly existence.” — But they knew that a star is not merely physical, but that every star is inhabited by spiritual powers with which they were connected in the spiritual world before descending to Earth. Humanity knew that when they had to shed their physical body at death, they would have to return once more to the world of the stars—that is, to the spiritual world. And the Sun was regarded as the most important of the stars, the Sun with its beings, among whom the highest was the one called the High Solar Being.

[ 6 ] From the Mysteries, people received the teaching that the High Solar Being gives human beings, before they come to Earth, the power to re-enter the spiritual and stellar worlds in the proper way after death. And the teachers of the Mysteries said to their students, and these students in turn said to the rest of humanity: It is the spiritual power of the Sun—the spiritual light—that carries you beyond death, and which you brought with you when you descended into earthly existence through birth.

[ 7 ] There were many prayers, there were many sublime teachings that came from the Mystery Teachers, and all of them were in praise, honor, and description of the High Solar Being. And these Mystery teachers told their disciples—and the disciples, in turn, told all of humanity—that when a person has passed through the gate of death, they must first enter the sphere of the lower stars and lower stellar beings, but then must ascend beyond the Sun. However, they cannot ascend beyond the Sun unless the power of the Solar Being is given to them. That is why, for people who understood this, their hearts grew especially warm when they were able to pray to the Spirit of the Sun, who grants them immortality.

[ 8 ] The poems and religious devotional practices centered on the sun held a value that particularly permeated people’s feelings and sensibilities. People felt connected to the God of the universe when they were able to perform the sun service. And among those peoples for whom such a sun service was customary, cultic rites took place—ceremonies that were specifically designed for this sun worship. This sun worship generally consisted of placing the image of the god in the tomb and, after a few days, removing it from the tomb again, as a sign that there is a god—the sun god—in the universe who repeatedly awakens people should they succumb to death. And while performing this ritual, the sacrificial priest would tell his disciples—and they, in turn, would pass this on to the rest of humanity—that this was the sign that, before you descended to Earth, you were in a spiritual realm where the Sun God resides.

[ 9 ] It was said to the followers of this sun worship: “Look up—the sun is shining, but that is only the outward manifestation of the solar being; behind this radiance lies the eternal Sun God, who grants you immortality.”

[ 10 ] Thus, the people who learned such things knew that they had descended from spiritual worlds into the earthly world and that they had forgotten the world in which the Sun God dwells.

[ 11 ] “You left the realm of the Sun God at your birth. You shall find it again through the power he has placed in your hearts when you pass through death”—so said the sacrificial priests to the believers.

[ 12 ] The initiated priests of these mysteries knew that the High Solar Being of whom they spoke to the believers was the same Being who would later be referred to as the Christ. But before the Mystery of Golgotha, these sacrificial priests had to tell the believers: If you want to know anything about Christ, you cannot seek him on Earth; you must rise to the mysteries of the Sun. Only beyond Earth will you find the mysteries of Christ.

[ 13 ] It was relatively easy for people to embrace such a teaching because they had an instinctive recollection of the realm of Christ from which they had descended to Earth. But humanity is subject to evolution, and the instinctive memory of pre-earthly spiritual life was gradually lost to humanity. Eight hundred years before the Mystery of Golgotha, only a very few people still had an instinctive memory of pre-earthly spiritual life.

[ 14 ] Just imagine: a person passes through death and goes out into the vastness of the stars. Little by little, they arrive at places where they see the stars from the other side—and thus also see the sun from the other side. From Earth, we see the sun as we are accustomed to seeing it now. After death, we go out into the cosmos and see the sun from the other side. But when one sees the sun from the other side, one does not see it as a physical disk, but as a realm of spiritual beings. And before the Mystery of Golgotha, people saw Christ in the sun from the other side, both after death and before birth. The Mystery teachers could remind their students of this vision of Christ, for they could evoke the idea: “Before I was on Earth, I saw the Sun from the other side.” — That was in ancient times, before the Mystery of Golgotha.

[ 15 ] But then came the time when this memory could no longer be evoked in people. About eight hundred years before the Mystery of Golgotha, people were able to evoke this memory less and less: “Before we came down to Earth, we saw the Christ from beyond the sun.” — And now, Mystery teachers could never have come to speak to people, saying: “Look up at the sun; that is the revelation of Christ.” — People would no longer have understood it. And it was then as if people on Earth had been completely forsaken by the Christ-force, as if they could no longer awaken within themselves any memory of the spiritual worlds.

[ 16 ] It was only then that what might be called the fear of death came upon humanity. For in the past, they had seen the physical body die, yet they knew that, as souls, they came from the realm of Christ and did not die. And people became deeply concerned about the fate of their immortal, eternal being within themselves. It was as if the connection between humanity and Christ had been severed. This was because people could no longer look up into the spiritual worlds, and because Christ could be found nowhere in the earthly world. Now, in the time when people could no longer find Christ beyond the sun in the supernatural realm, Christ descended to Earth out of infinite grace and infinite compassion, so that people might find Him on Earth.

[ 17 ] Something has occurred in the evolution of the worlds that has no parallel anywhere else in all that human beings can know. For all those beings who stand above human beings—angels, archangels, archai, and so on up to the highest divine beings—underwent only transformations, metamorphoses, in the spiritual world. They were not born and did not die. It was said in the mysteries of that time: Only human beings know birth and death. The gods know only metamorphoses; they do not know birth and death.

[ 18 ] Since human beings could no longer reach Christ, Christ came to them on earth. To do this, it was necessary for him, as God, to undergo what gods had never undergone before: birth and death. Christ became the soul of a human being, Jesus of Nazareth, and went through birth and death—that is, for the first time, a God made His way through human death. This is the essence of the Mystery of Golgotha: that it is not merely a human affair, but a divine one. The gods have decided: One of us, the High Solar Being himself, shall unite his destiny with that of humanity to such an extent that he will pass through birth and death. — Since that time, human beings have always been able to look to what took place on Golgotha and find on earth what they would otherwise have lost because their consciousness no longer reached up into the heavens: the Christ.

[ 19 ] Those who first experienced these mysteries of Golgotha still possessed a final remnant of an instinctive awareness of what had taken place there. These were the disciples and apostles of Christ. And they knew: The same being that one could previously find only by gazing spiritually toward the sun can now be found by understanding in the right way the birth, life, and suffering of Christ Jesus.

[ 20 ] At the time of the Mystery of Golgotha, there were still a few people who knew: The One who was the Christ in Jesus of Nazareth is the High Solar Being who descended to Earth. — Up until the 4th century after the Mystery of Golgotha, people still knew that the Christ, who is the Solar Being, and the Christ who lived in Jesus of Nazareth were one and the same Being. And one can feel this particularly deeply when, through spiritual science, one hears how people in the early Christian centuries prayed fervently: “We thank the Christ Being, from whom we would otherwise have been separated on Earth, for having descended from the spiritual worlds to us here on Earth!”

[ 21 ] Once the 4th century following the Mystery of Golgotha had passed, it was no longer possible to conceive that the High Solar Being and Christ were the very deity who ensures one’s immortality as a human being. From the 4th century on, right up to our own time, people had only the outward words of the Gospels, which historically recount that there was a Mystery of Golgotha. Yet the words of the Gospels exerted such a powerful influence throughout the centuries that people were able, through these words, to turn their hearts toward the Mystery of Golgotha.

[ 22 ] Today, however, we are facing a time when people, having learned so much about the mysteries of nature, would become completely estranged from the words of the Gospels if a new path to Christ were not paved. Anthroposophy seeks to pave this path by leading people back to an understanding of the spiritual world. For the Christ event can only be understood as a spiritual reality, as a spiritual fact. Anyone who cannot understand the Christ event as a spiritual fact cannot understand it at all.

[ 23 ] Through anthroposophical insight, we can transport ourselves back to the time when Christ Jesus walked in Palestine and lived out his earthly destiny. We can look into the hearts of the disciples and apostles, who, in accordance with their instinctive insight, knew: The being who once dwelt only in the sun has descended to Earth and walked among us. The being who walked among us as Christ Jesus—who thereby set foot on Earth—was once to be found only in the sun, — So these disciples said to themselves: The sunlight shines upon us from the eyes of Jesus of Nazareth; the power of the warming sun speaks to us through the words of Jesus of Nazareth. When Jesus of Nazareth walks among us, it is as if the sun itself were sending forth its light and power into the world.

[ 24 ] Those who were able to understand this said to themselves: Thus does the solar being walk among us in human form—a being who could formerly be reached only when our gaze was directed upward from Earth toward the spiritual world itself. — And because the disciples and apostles were able to say this to themselves, they also maintained the proper attitude and understanding toward the death of Christ. That is why they were able to remain disciples of Christ Jesus, even after Christ Jesus had already passed through death on Earth.

[ 25 ] We know from spiritual scientific insight that Christ, after he had left the body of Jesus of Nazareth, walked among his disciples in spirit and continued to teach them. The power that the disciples and apostles had received—which enabled them to be taught by him even when Christ appeared to them only in his spiritual body—was, however, lost to them after some time. There comes a point in the lives of the disciples of Christ Jesus when they said to themselves: We have seen him; we no longer see him. He descended from heaven to us on earth. Where has he gone?

[ 26 ] This moment, when the disciples once again believed they had lost the presence of Christ, is commemorated in the Christian Feast of the Ascension. It commemorates the fact that the High Solar Spirit, who had walked the earth in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, had once again vanished from the disciples’ sight. And now, after Christ’s disciples had undergone this experience, a ‘grief unlike any other that can exist on earth’ came upon them. In the ancient mysteries, when the sun cult was celebrated and the image of the god was laid into the earth, only to be removed again after several days, a great sorrow over the death of the god came over the souls. But this sorrow could not be compared in magnitude to the sorrow that now entered the hearts of Christ’s disciples.

[ 27 ] All true, great knowledge is born of pain and sorrow. If one attempts to walk the path into the higher worlds using the means of knowledge described in anthroposophical spiritual science, one can only reach one’s goal by passing through pain. Without having suffered—having suffered greatly and thereby been freed from the oppressive weight of pain—one cannot perceive the spiritual world.

[ 28 ] During the period indicated to us by the ten days following the Ascension, the disciples of Christ suffered immensely because the sight of Christ had vanished from them. And out of this pain, out of this infinite sorrow, sprang what we call the mystery of Pentecost. After losing the outward, instinctive vision of Christ, Christ’s disciples found him again within themselves—in their feelings, in their experience—through their grief and pain.

[ 29 ] Let us now look back once more to earlier times. Before the Mystery of Golgotha, people had a memory of their pre-earthly existence. They knew that in this pre-earthly existence they had received the power from Christ to attain immortality. Now they knew that through their own human power they could not look back into the spiritual world, into their pre-earthly existence. And the disciples now turned their attention to everything they remembered about the event at Golgotha. And out of this memory and this pain, the realization dawned anew in their souls of what humanity had lost because it no longer possessed instinctive clairvoyance.

[ 30 ] The ancients had thus said: “Before we were born on Earth, we were with Christ. From him we have received the power of immortality.” — And now, ten days after they had lost sight of Christ’s physical form, Christ’s disciples said: “We have seen the Mystery of Golgotha.” This gives us the strength to feel our immortal nature once again. — This is symbolically expressed by the tongues of fire. Therefore, from a spiritual scientific perspective, we can also see in the mystery of Pentecost that the Mystery of Golgotha has taken the place of the ancient solar mystery myth.

[ 31 ] That one is dealing with the Solar Being within the Christ became particularly clear to Paul when he had the Damascus experience. Paul was a disciple of the ancient initiates of the Mysteries. It had become clear to him that the Christ can only be found by entering the spiritual world through clairvoyance. Now he said: There are disciples who claim that the Solar Being once lived within a human being and passed through death. That cannot be correct, for the Solar Being can only be seen outside of the Earth. — As long as Paul believed this based on his knowledge of the mysteries, he opposed Christianity.

[ 32 ] Through his revelation near Damascus, Paul came to realize: Even if one has not been raptured into the spiritual worlds, one can still behold the Christ. He has therefore truly descended to Earth. — From that moment on, he knew: The disciples of Christ Jesus are right, for the High Solar Being has now descended from heaven to earth.

[ 33 ] If Christ had not appeared on Earth, if he had remained merely the God of the Sun, humanity would have fallen into decay on Earth. People would have come to believe more and more simply that material things exist—that the sun is a material thing, that the stars are material things. —For people had completely forgotten that they themselves had descended from a pre-earthly existence, from the spiritual world of the stars.

[ 34 ] But one can only hold onto the belief that everything is material for a certain amount of time. If, for example, all people were to believe for a century that everything is material, they would lose the inner power of the spirit within themselves and become paralyzed, as if they were ill. This is indeed what would have become of humanity if Christ had not descended to Earth from the spiritual world out of infinite mercy.

[ 35 ] You will say: Yes, but many people still want nothing to do with Christ; they have no faith in Christ. What about them? Why haven’t they become paralyzed, weak, and sickly? — But you see, Christ appeared on earth when the Mystery of Golgotha took place, not merely to teach people, but to live through the reality of His appearance on earth. He died for all people. The physical constitution of all people—even those who did not believe in Christ—has been improved and saved by the event at Golgotha. Until now, one could be a Chinese, a Japanese, or a Hindu and want to know nothing about Christ. Nevertheless, Christ died for all people.

[ 36 ] This will not be possible in the same way in the future, for in the future, knowledge will become far more decisive for humanity than it has been up to now. As humanity evolves, it will become increasingly necessary for all people to attain a certain understanding of the spiritual nature and spiritual life.

[ 37 ] Anthroposophical spiritual research strives for this kind of insight, which leads all people into the spiritual world. And with this insight, one can also come to recognize Christ—but in such a way that, if one possesses true anthroposophy, one can portray Christ in a manner that is understandable to all people. With what has been proclaimed as Christianity up to now, one could go to Africa and Asia: individual people might have professed faith in Christ, but the vast majority of the peoples rejected it, for they could not understand what the missionaries were saying.

[ 38 ] What kinds of religions did the peoples have? The peoples had religions that arose within their own communities and were understood only by that particular people, because a sacred place or a sacred figure was venerated within that community. As long as the ancient Egyptians worshipped their god in Thebes, people had to go to Thebes to worship at that god’s sanctuary. As long as Zeus was worshipped in Olympia, people had to go to Olympia to worship Zeus there. Likewise, Muslims must go to Mecca.

[ 39 ] Some of this has been preserved even within Christianity itself. If one understands Christianity correctly, one knows: the sun shines upon all people; it shines upon Thebes; it shines upon Olympia; it shines upon Mecca. The sun can be seen physically everywhere in the same way; therefore, the High Solar Being, Christ, can also be worshiped spiritually. And so anthroposophy will show people that the Being who, before the Mystery of Golgotha, could be reached only through instinctive, supernatural faculties, has, since the Mystery of Golgotha, become accessible to people through the power of knowledge to be acquired on Earth itself. People will once again understand the saying: “The kingdoms of heaven have come down to earth”—and will not speak of the Millennium in some vague, mystical way, but will understand: What used to be found on the Sun can now be found on Earth. — And one will say to oneself: Since the Mystery of Golgotha, we have had Christ, because he has descended to Earth and dwells among human beings here on Earth as well.

[ 40 ] We will be able to experience again and again what the disciples felt was the mystery of Pentecost: Christ Himself has descended to earth. In our hearts, His power arises as the power that ensures immortality for humankind. — But one must also be able to take the words of Christ very seriously and in their profound truth, for example, a statement such as: “I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” And if one can take such a statement very seriously in its spiritual depth, then one will also bring oneself to the realization: Christ was not present only at the beginning of our calendar. He is always there; he speaks to us, if only we are willing to listen. — But to do this, we must once again learn, through spiritual science, to see the spiritual in every material being: the spiritual behind the stone, the spiritual behind the plant, the spiritual behind the animals, the spiritual behind human beings, the spiritual behind the clouds, the spiritual behind the stars, the spiritual behind the sun. When we once again find the Spirit in its reality through matter, then we also open our human soul to the voice of Christ, who wants to speak to us, if only we are willing to listen.

[ 41 ] And anthroposophy can speak of the fact that Spirit lies behind all of nature. That is why it can also speak of the fact that Spirit is present in the entire history of humanity on Earth, and can speak of the fact that the Earth has only regained its meaning through the Mystery of Golgotha.

[ 42 ] Before the Mystery of Golgotha, the Earth-spirit resided on the Sun. Since the Mystery of Golgotha, the Earth-spirit has been united with the Earth itself. Anthroposophy seeks to bring this truth to humanity as an everlasting Pentecost mystery. And when people are ready to seek out the spiritual world once more through anthroposophy, they will also rediscover Christ as one who is ever-present, in a way that is necessary for people of our time.

[ 43 ] If people today do not turn to spiritual understanding, then Christ will be lost. Until now, Christianity has not depended on understanding. Christ died for all people. He did not reject humanity. If people today reject him in their understanding, then they are rejecting Christ.

[ 44 ] Since we were able to gather together this time around the Feast of Pentecost, I wanted to speak to you about the Mystery of Christ in connection with the mystery of Pentecost.

[ 45 ] People often speak of anthroposophy as if it were an enemy of Christianity. If you truly take in the spirit of anthroposophy, you will find that it will, in fact, open the human ear, the human heart, and the entire human soul once again to the mystery of Christ.

[ 46 ] My dear friends, the destiny of anthroposophy should also be that of Christianity. For this to happen, however, it is necessary that people today look not merely to the dead words that speaks to them of Christ, but that they turn to a knowledge that leads them to that very light in which the living Christ—not the historical one who lived on Earth centuries ago, but the one who lives now and in every moment of the future on Earth among human beings, because he has become their divine brother through their God—is contained.

[ 47 ] Let us therefore include this in our reflections on Pentecost: that we seek, through anthroposophy, the path to the living Christ, and feel that through this, the first mystery of Pentecost can be renewed in every anthroposophist—that the knowledge of Christ himself may dawn in their hearts, and that they may feel warmed and enlightened by the fiery tongue of Christian worldview.

[ 48 ] Let our path to the spiritual through anthroposophy also be our path to Christ through the Spirit! And if even a small number of people sincerely commit themselves to this, then this mystery of Pentecost will also take root more and more deeply in the hearts of many people today—and especially in the future. And then what humanity so desperately needs for its recovery and healing will come. Then the healing Spirit—the Spirit sent by Christ to heal the sickness of human souls—will speak to a new understanding of humanity. Then what humanity needs will come: a World Pentecost!