The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Eighth Lecture

[ 1 ] Today we are marked by a painful memory, and we wish to place the very subject of this lecture firmly within the context of that painful memory. The lecture I had the privilege of giving in our old building exactly one year ago: those of you who were present will recall how it took us on a journey, beginning with a description of earthly, natural conditions, up into the spiritual worlds and the revelations of these spiritual worlds as found in the “Scripture of the Stars”; how it then became possible to connect the human heart, the human soul, and the human spirit—in their very essence—with what can be found when one takes the path out of the earthly realm, not only into the vastness of the stars, but into that which, through the vastness of the stars, reflects the spiritual like a cosmic script. And the last thing I was permitted to write on the blackboard in that room—which was taken from us shortly thereafter—was entirely aimed at lifting the human soul up to spiritual heights. Thus, on that very evening, we were directly connecting to that to which the entire essence of our Goetheanum renovation was meant to be dedicated. And regarding what was taken up at that time, let me speak today, first of all, as a continuation of the very lecture that was given here a year ago.

[ 2 ] When, in the period preceding the burning of Ephesus, people spoke of the Mysteries, all those who had some understanding in their hearts of the nature of the Mysteries spoke in such a way that their words sounded something like this: Human knowledge, human wisdom, has a place, a home, in the Mysteries. — And when, in those ancient times, the spiritual guides of the world spoke of the Mysteries—that is, when the Mysteries were spoken of in the supersensible worlds—I may use these terms, although they naturally describe only figuratively the way in which thought descends from the supersensible worlds and works into the sensible ones— when, then, the Mysteries were spoken of in the supersensible worlds, the discourse sounded something like this: In the Mysteries, human beings erect places where we gods can find the sacrificers who understand us through the sacrifice. For indeed, this was the general consciousness of the ancient world—of those who knew in the ancient world—that gods and human beings met in the mystery sites, and that everything that sustains and upholds the world depends on what takes place in the mysteries between the gods and between human beings.

[ 3 ] But there is a word that has indeed been handed down historically, a word that can speak powerfully to the human heart from this historical tradition, yet speaks with particular power when one sees it taking shape out of very special events—as if inscribed in the history of humanity with letters of bronze, visible in the spirit only for a moment. And I believe such a word can always be seen when the spiritual gaze turns to the deed of Herostratus, the burning of Ephesus. In these flames, one can find the ancient word: the envy of the gods.

[ 4 ] I believe, however, that among the various terms handed down from ancient times—which, in the context of life in those days, are to be understood in the way I have just described—this one is among the most terrifying in this physical world: the envy of the gods. In those ancient times, the word “god” was used to designate everything that existed in a supersensible form in such a way that it never needed to appear in a physical body on earth, and in those ancient times people distinguished between the most diverse families of gods. And most certainly, those divine-spiritual beings who are so closely connected to humanity that, in their innermost essence, human beings have come into being through them and have been guided through the course of time—these divine-spiritual beings, whom we sense through the majesty and the smallest manifestations of external nature, whom we sense through that which lives within us—these divine -spiritual beings cannot become envious. But in ancient times, the envy of the gods was nevertheless understood to mean something very real. If we trace the period during which the human race developed up to the time of Ephesus, we find that the more advanced human individuals did indeed take to themselves much of what the good gods gladly bestowed upon them in the mysteries. For we are absolutely correct in saying: There exists an intimate relationship between the hearts of good human beings and the good gods, a relationship that was bound ever more firmly within the Mysteries, so that it became apparent to certain other, Luciferic-Ahrimanic divine beings that human beings were being drawn ever closer and closer to the good deities. And thus arose the envy of the gods toward human beings. — And we must hear it again and again throughout history: how, in ancient times, a person striving toward the spirit—when he or she falls prey to a tragic fate—is described in such a way that his or her tragic fate is linked to the envy of the gods.

[ 5 ] The Greeks knew that this envy of the gods existed, and they attributed much of what outwardly took place in human development to this envy of the gods. The burning of Ephesus actually revealed that a certain spiritual advancement of humanity is only possible when people became aware that there are gods—that is, supersensible beings—who are envious of humanity’s further progress. — This, after all, gives the entire history that followed the burning of Ephesus—I might also say, the birth of Alexander—its distinctive character. And part of the correct understanding of the Mystery of Golgotha is this: one must look upon a world filled with the envy of certain lineages of gods. — Yes, the spiritual atmosphere in Greece had in fact been filled with the effects of this envy of the gods since a time shortly after the Persian Wars. And what was then accomplished during the Macedonian period had to be done with the full awareness that the envy of the gods reigns over the earth’s surface in the spiritual atmosphere. But it was done courageously, boldly, defying the misunderstandings of both gods and humans.

[ 6 ] And into this atmosphere, filled with the envy of the gods, descended the deed of that God who was capable of the greatest love that can exist in the world. One can only see the Mystery of Golgotha in its true light if, in addition to everything else, one can also add the image of the clouds in the ancient world—in Hellas, Macedonia, the Near East, North Africa, and Southern Europe—the image of the clouds that are the expression of the gods’ envy. And wonderfully warming, gently radiant, the love that flows through the Mystery of Golgotha pours into this cloud-filled atmosphere.

[ 7 ] What was once, if I may put it that way, a matter that took place between gods and humans must, in our time—the age of human freedom—take place more down in the physical realm of human life. And one can indeed describe how it takes place. In ancient times, when people thought of the Mysteries, they spoke of them on earth: Human knowledge, human wisdom has a home in the Mysteries. — When they were among the gods, they said: When we descend into the Mysteries, we find the sacrifices of human beings, and in the human being who offers the sacrifice, we are understood.

[ 8 ] Essentially, the fire of Ephesus marked the beginning of the era in which the mystery cults gradually disappeared in their ancient form. I have described how it persisted here and there—in a magnificent way, for example, in the Mysteries of Hybernia, where the Mystery of Golgotha was celebrated in the cult at the very same time it was taking place physically over in Palestine. Knowledge of it came only through spiritual mediation between Palestine and Hybernia, not through physical mediation. Nevertheless, the mystery tradition in the physical world declined more and more. The outer sanctuaries—the meeting places between gods and humans—lost their significance more and more. They had lost it almost completely by the 13th and 14th centuries A.D. For anyone who wanted to find the way to the Holy Grail, for example, had to know how to travel spiritual paths. Physical paths had been taken in ancient times, before the burning of Ephesus. Spiritual paths had to be taken in the Middle Ages.

[ 9 ] In particular, however, one had to follow spiritual paths if one wished to attain genuine Rosicrucian instruction from the 13th and 14th centuries onward, and especially from the 15th century onward. For the temples of the Rosicrucians were deeply hidden from outward, physical perception. Many true Rosicrucians were visitors to the temples, but no outward, physical human eye could find them. Yet there could be disciples who came to these ancient Rosicrucians, who could be found here and there like hermits of knowledge and sacred human action—found by those who can perceive the language of the gods in the gentle radiance of their eyes. I am not speaking in any figurative sense. I do not wish to describe a mere image; I wish to describe a reality that, in the era to which I am referring, was truly a very significant reality. One could find the Rosicrucian Master once one had acquired the ability to perceive the language of heaven in the gentle radiance of the physical gaze. Then, in the most unassuming of surroundings, in the most unassuming of human circumstances—precisely in the 14th, 15th centuries in Central Europe, these remarkable personalities who were filled with God within, who were inwardly connected to the spiritual temples that existed—but to which access was truly as difficult as that described in the well-known legend as the path to the Holy Grail.

[ 10 ] Then, when one looks at what took place between such a Rosicrucian Master and his disciple, one can overhear many a conversation that, even in the context of modern times, embodies divine wisdom walking upon the earth. The teachings were thoroughly concrete. There, in his solitude, a Rosicrucian Master was found by a disciple who had set his heart on seeking and finding him. There, one of the disciples looked into the gentle eyes from which the language of the gods speaks, and there, without pretense, he received the following instruction.

[ 11 ] Look, my son, at your own being. You carry within you that body which your outer physical eyes see. The center of the Earth sends this body the forces that make it visible. That is your physical body. But look around you at your surroundings here on Earth. You see the stones; they are allowed to be on the Earth in their own right; they belong on the Earth. Once they have taken on a form, they can retain that form through the Earth’s forces. Look at the crystal: it carries its form within itself; it retains this form of its own being through the Earth. Your physical body cannot do this. If your soul leaves it, the Earth destroys it; it dissolves it into dust. The Earth has no power over your physical body. It has the power to form and sustain the transparent, wonderfully shaped crystal structures; it has no power to sustain the form of your physical body—it must dissolve it into dust. Your physical body does not come from the Earth. Your physical body is of a high spiritual nature. Seraphim, Cherubim, Thrones—to them belongs that which is the form and shape of your physical body. This physical body does not belong to the earth; it belongs to the highest spiritual powers initially accessible to you. The earth can destroy it, but it can never build it up.

[ 12 ] And within this physical body of yours dwells your etheric body. The day will come when your physical body will be taken from the earth to be destroyed. Then your etheric body will dissolve into the vastness of the cosmos. The vastness of the cosmos can indeed dissolve this etheric body, but it cannot build it up. Only those divine-spiritual beings who belong to the hierarchy of Dynamis, Exusiai, and Kyriotetes can build it up. It is to them that you owe your etheric body. You unite the physical substances of the earth with your physical body. But what is within you transforms the physical substances of the earth in such a way that they become unlike anything else that is physical in the environment surrounding the physical body. Your etheric body moves everything within you that is fluid, everything that is water. The juices that circulate there are under the influence of your etheric body. But look at your blood: Exusiai, Dynamis, Kyriotetes—it is they who cause this blood to circulate as a fluid through your veins. You are human only as a physical body. In your etheric body, you are still an animal, but an animal that is spiritualized by the second hierarchy.

[ 13 ] What I am summarizing for you here—albeit in just a few words—was the subject of a long lesson given by that Master, in whose gentle gaze the student heard the language of heaven. The student was then directed to the third member of the human being, which we call the astral body. It was made clear to the student that this astral body contains the impulses for breathing, for everything that is air in the human organism, for everything that pulsates as air within the human organism. But although the earthly realm strives, over a long period of time, after a human being has passed through the gate of death, to stir, as it were, within the airy realm—and the rumbling of the astral bodies of the deceased can be perceived for years by a clairvoyant gaze in the atmospheric phenomena of the Earth—the Earth, with its surroundings, can do nothing else with regard to the impulses of the astral body but dissolve them. For only the beings of the third hierarchy—the Archai, Archangeloi, and Angeloi—can form them.

[ 14 ] And so, striking the student deep in the heart, the Master said: You belong to your physical body insofar as you absorb the mineral kingdom and transform it; insofar as you absorb the human kingdom and process it, you belong to the Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones. Insofar as you are an etheric body, you are animal-like in the etheric realm, but there you belong to the spirits designated as those of the second hierarchy: Kyriotetes, Dynamis, Exusiai; and insofar as you reign in the liquid element, you do not belong to the earth, but to this hierarchy. And insofar as you reign in the airy element, you do not belong to the Earth, but to the hierarchy of the Angeloi, Archangeloi, and Archai.

[ 15 ] And after the student had received this instruction to a sufficient degree, he no longer felt himself to be a member of the Earth. In a sense, he felt—emanating from his physical, etheric, and astral bodies—the forces that connect him, through the mineral world, to the first hierarchy; through the watery earth, to the second hierarchy; and through the air realm, to the third hierarchy. And it was clear to him: he lives on Earth solely through that which he carries within himself as the element of warmth. Thus, the Rosicrucian disciple perceived the warmth he carries within himself—the physical warmth he carries—as the very essence of what is earthly and human. And more and more he learned to feel a kinship between this physical warmth and the warmth of the soul and the warmth of the spirit. And while later humanity has increasingly failed to recognize how its physical, etheric, and astral constitutions are connected to the Divine through the solid, liquid, and gaseous states, the Rosicrucian disciple knew this quite well and understood that the truly earthly-human essence is the element of warmth. The moment this secret—the connection between the element of warmth and the human-earthly—became clear to the student of the Rosicrucian Master, at that very moment he knew how to link his humanity to the spiritual.

[ 16 ] And in those often quite modest homes where such Rosicrucian masters lived, it was there that, before entering, the disciples were prepared in a way that was often unsought and even seemed miraculous, by having their attention drawn—one in this way, another in that way; outwardly, it often appeared to be a coincidence—by having their attention drawn to the following: You must seek where your spiritual nature can connect with the cosmic-spiritual. — And when the student had received that instruction of which I have just spoken to you, then—yes, then—he could say to his master: I now leave you with the greatest comfort that could have been mine on earth. For by showing me that the earthly human being truly finds his element in warmth, you have given me the opportunity to connect my physical being with the soul and the spirit. I do not bring the soul into the solid bones, into the liquid blood, or into the air-like breath. I bring it into the element of warmth.

[ 17 ] And it was with an immense sense of peace that those who had been thus instructed in those days departed from their masters. And from the serenity of their countenances—which expressed the result of great consolation—that gentle gaze gradually emerged, through which the language of heaven can speak. And so, a deeply spiritual teaching essentially persisted well into the first third of the 15th century, hidden from the events recorded by external history. But a form of instruction took place there that encompassed the whole human being—an instruction that enabled the human soul to connect its own being to the sphere of the cosmic-spiritual.

[ 18 ] This entire spiritual atmosphere has faded away over the course of the last few centuries. It is no longer present in our civilization. And an external civilization, alien to God, has spread across the very sites that once witnessed such things as I have just described to you. Today, one stands there with the memory—which can only be evoked in the spirit, in the astral light—of many a scene similar to the one I have just described to you. This sets the basic mood one feels today when looking back on those times, which are often portrayed as so dark, and then looking at our own time. But as we take this look, a deep longing arises in our hearts—born of the spiritual revelations that have become available to humanity since the last third of the 19th century—to speak to people once again in a spiritual way. And the spiritual way cannot be expressed merely through abstract words; the spiritual way demands various symbols in order to speak in a comprehensive manner. And such a language—one that was to be found for those spiritual beings who are to speak to modern humanity—such a form of expression was embodied in the forms of our Goetheanum, which burned down a year ago. Truly, it was through these forms that what had been spoken from the podium to the audience in the form of ideas was to continue speaking. And thus, in a certain sense, the Goetheanum embodied something that could truly evoke the past in an entirely new form.

[ 19 ] When the initiate entered the temple of Ephesus, his gaze was drawn to that statue I have been speaking of these past few days—the statue that, in a sense, called out to him in the language of the heart: “Unite yourself with the world ether, and you will behold the earthly realm from the heights of the ether.” — Thus, many a disciple of Ephesus beheld the earthly realm from the heights of the ether. And a certain race of gods grew envious. But in the face of the gods’ envy, centuries before the Mystery of Golgotha, courageous human beings nevertheless found a way to carry forward—albeit in a weakened form, yet only to the extent that it could continue to work—that which had been at work from the ancient, sacred years of human development up to the burning of Ephesus. And had our Goetheanum been fully completed, then upon entering from the west, one’s gaze would have fallen upon that statue in which humanity would have found the call to recognize itself as a cosmic being, placed between the forces of the Luciferic and the forces of the Ahrimanic, in an inner, God-sustained balance of being. And when one looked at the forms of the columns and the architraves, they spoke a language—a language that was the continuation of the language that, as it were, interpreted the spiritual in ideas from the podium. The words continued to resonate along the sculpturally rendered forms. And high up in the dome, one could see those scenes that could bring the development of humanity to life before the spiritual gaze. Even in this Goetheanum, for those who were able to feel it, there was a reminder of the Temple of Ephesus to be seen.

[ 20 ] But the memory became terribly painful when, in a manner not unlike the old one—precisely at the point in its development when the Goetheanum was supposed to have transformed itself into the bearer of the renewal of spiritual life—the torch was now also thrown into this Goetheanum.

[ 21 ] My dear friends, our grief was deep. Our grief was indescribable. But we resolved to continue our work for the spiritual world undeterred by the saddest, most tragic event that could have befallen us. For one could say to oneself in one’s heart: If one looks upon the flames rising from Ephesus, the envy of the gods appears written within the flames—in a time when people, still unfree, were compelled to follow the will of both good and evil gods.

[ 22 ] In our time, people are organized toward freedom. And a year ago, on New Year’s Eve, we gazed upon the consuming flames. The red blaze reached toward the sky. Dark blue and reddish-yellow lines of flame flickered through the vast sea of fire, emanating from the metallic instruments housed in the Goetheanum—a gigantic sea of fire with the most varied colorful elements. And when one looked into this sea of flames with its colorful lines within—speaking to the pain of the soul—one could not help but read: the envy of humankind.

[ 23 ] This is how what speaks of the progression of human development from epoch to epoch comes together, even in the midst of the greatest misfortune. A thread runs from the word that expresses the greatest misfortune of the time when people, still in bondage, looked up to the gods but were meant to free themselves from that bondage; a thread of spiritual development runs from that misfortune, when one saw inscribed in the flames: the envy of the gods—all the way to our own misfortune, where human beings are to find the power of freedom within themselves and where the words inscribed in the flames were: the envy of human beings. In Ephesus, the statue of the god; here at the Goetheanum, the statue of the human being, the statue of the representative of humanity, Christ Jesus, in whom we sought, identifying with him, to merge in all humility with this knowledge—just as, in their own way—a way no longer fully comprehensible to humanity today—the disciples of Ephesus once merged with the Diana of Ephesus.

[ 24 ] The pain does not lessen when we look back, in historical perspective, at what New Year’s Eve last year brought us. It was meant to be—when I was allowed to stand on the podium for the last time, which had been erected there in harmony with the entire structure—that the gaze of the audience at that time, the gaze of the soul, should be directed toward the ascent from earthly realms into stellar realms, which express the will and wisdom, the light of the spiritual cosmos. I know that some of the spirits who taught their students in the Middle Ages—as I have described to you—were the guiding forces behind that event. And one hour after the last word was spoken, I was summoned to the burning of the Goetheanum. And at the burning of the Goetheanum, we spent New Year’s Eve of last year.

[ 25 ] One need only utter these words, and something indescribable stirs within all our hearts, within all our souls. But whenever something like this has swept away a sacred aspect of human development, there have always been some who vowed to continue working—after the dissolution of the physical—in the spirit to which the physical was dedicated. And I think that, since we are gathered at this moment, on the anniversary of our Goetheanum disaster, we may remember that our souls are in the right frame of mind for this gathering of ours if we all vow to carry forward in the spirit—through the wave of human progress—that which was presented through the physical form, physical image, and physical structure of the Goetheanum, even though it has been taken away from the physical eye by a Herostratos-like act. Our pain is bound up with the old Goetheanum. We will only become worthy of that which has, after all, been entrusted to us through the fact that we were allowed to build this Goetheanum if we make a vow today, in remembrance, to remain faithful—each one before the divine best that he or she carries in the soul—to the spiritual impulses that found their outer form in that Goetheanum. This Goetheanum could be taken from us. The spirit of this Goetheanum cannot be taken from us if we truly and sincerely desire it. And it will be least taken from us if, in this solemn solemn hour—which separates us only a short time from the moment a year ago when flames burst forth from our beloved Goetheanum—if at this very moment we not only feel the pain anew but, out of this pain, vow to remain faithful to that spirit to which we were permitted to build this place over the course of ten years. Then, my dear friends, if this inner vow springs honestly and sincerely from our hearts today, if we can transform the pain and suffering into an impulse for action, then we will also transform this sad event into a blessing. The pain cannot be lessened by this, but it is up to us to find, precisely out of this pain, the impetus for action—for action in the spirit.

[ 26 ] And so, my dear friends, let us look back on the terrible flames that filled us with such unspeakable sorrow. But today, as we dedicate ourselves to the highest divine forces within ourselves, let us feel the sacred flame in our hearts—a flame meant to spiritually illuminate and warm that which was intended for the Goetheanum—as we carry this intention forward through the waves of human progress. So let us now, in deep reflection, repeat the words I was allowed to speak over there about a year ago at roughly this same time. At that time I said something like this: We are living through a New Year’s Eve; we must look forward to a new world year. — Oh, if only the Goetheanum were still among us, this call could be renewed at this very moment! It is no longer among us. Precisely because it is no longer among us, I believe this call may be uttered with manifold increased strength on this New Year’s Eve. Let us carry the soul of the Goetheanum over into the new world year, and let us strive to erect in the new Goetheanum a worthy monument, a worthy memorial to the body of the old one. This, my dear friends, binds our hearts to the old Goetheanum, which we had to surrender to the elements. But let it also bind our hearts to the spirit, to the soul of this Goetheanum. And with this pledge to the very best within ourselves, let us carry on not merely into the new year, but let us carry on—energetic, spirit-bearing, soul-guiding—into the new world year.

[ 27 ] My dear friends, you have welcomed me by rising up in remembrance of the old Goetheanum. You live in the memory of this old Goetheanum. Let us now rise as a sign that we pledge to continue working in the spirit of the Goetheanum with the best of our abilities, which we can find within the image of our human nature. Yes, so be it. Amen.

[ 28 ] And so let us continue in this way, my dear friends, for as long as we can, in accordance with the will that unites our human souls with the souls of the gods, to whom we wish to remain faithful in the spirit from which we sought this fidelity to them at a certain point in our lives, when we sought the spiritual science of the Goetheanum. And may we understand how to uphold this loyalty.