The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Easter as a Chapter in the History of Humanity's Mysteries IV

[ 1 ] We have seen how, out of the mysteries, that which connects human beings to the world in their consciousness has developed in such a way that this connection can be expressed in the festive cycle of the year, and we have seen in particular how the Easter festival has grown out of the principle of initiation. From this entire account, it will have become clear to you what a significant role the mystery traditions have played in the entire development of humanity.

[ 2 ] The fact is that, when it comes to these mysteries, essentially everything that has taken place spiritually in the world and developed through humanity originated in the mysteries in ancient times. If one were to use a modern term, one would have to say: The mysteries were very powerful in terms of the overall guidance of spiritual life.

[ 3 ] Now, humanity was destined from the very beginning to develop freedom. For freedom to develop, it was necessary for the ancient mystery cults to decline and for people, for a time, to be less bound by the powerful guidance that emanated from the mysteries and, in a sense, to be left more to their own devices. One certainly cannot say that the time has already come when people have already attained their true inner freedom and are now ready to move on to the next stage, which is to follow the age of freedom. Certainly, one cannot say that. But at any rate, a sufficient number of people have passed through incarnations in which the power of the Mysteries was felt less than in earlier times. And even if the seed of having passed through these incarnations has not yet sprouted today, it is within people. It lies within human souls.

[ 4 ] When an age approaches that is once again more spiritual, people will develop what they have not yet developed today in their spiritual dullness. But above all, it will be necessary that the knowledge, insight, and experience of the spiritual—which can be drawn from today’s initiation—be met with appreciation and reverence, arising from a place of freedom. For without appreciation, without reverence, true knowledge and a spiritual life for humanity are actually impossible. After all, we make proper use of the festival times when we use them precisely to try, even if only a little, to instill in our souls this appreciation, this reverence for the spiritual as it has developed throughout human history; when we learn to look as intimately as possible at the way in which external historical events signify the spiritual and carry the spiritual from one age to the next. To begin with, it is true that human beings, through repeated earthly lives, return time and again to earthly existence. Through this, they carry over into later epochs what they have experienced in earlier ones. Human beings are the most important link in the further development of what takes place within human history. But human beings live, after all, in a specific environment at all times. And one of the most important environments is indeed the environment of the mysteries. One of the most important aspects of human progress is the transmission of what people have experienced and relive in the mysteries—whether again within the mysteries themselves, where it radiates out into humanity, or in some other way through spiritual insight. Today, this must indeed take place in some other way through spiritual insight, for the true essence of the mysteries has more or less receded from the modern outer world and must first re-emerge.

[ 5 ] We must indeed say: It is certainly true that if that impulse which went out from here, from the Goetheanum, during the Christmas Conference truly takes root in the Anthroposophical Society, then the Anthroposophical Society, by leading the way toward the classes that are to be established—the establishment of which has, in part, already begun—will be the foundation for the further development of the mystery tradition. The future mystery tradition must be consciously planted by this Anthroposophical Society. This Anthroposophical Society now faces an event that can be utilized in its development just as a similar event was once utilized: the burning of the Temple of Ephesus. Here and there, a significant injustice lay at the root of it. However, things appear differently on different levels, and what is a terrible injustice on one level can then be utilized within the freedom of human beings in the sense that it is precisely through such horrific events that genuine human progress is brought about.

[ 6 ] However, if one wishes to approach such matters with understanding, one must, as I have already said, grasp them as intimately as possible. One must look into the particular way in which the spiritual aspect of the world was lived out in the Mysteries. Yesterday I pointed out how the setting of the annual Easter festival grows out of the constellations of the Sun and Moon, when viewed spiritually, and I pointed out that the other planets are observed from the Moon’s perspective. And based on what one experiences in observing the other planets, a person is guided—as they descend from pre-earthly existence into earthly existence—in how to form their light-etheric body.

[ 7 ] Well, if one wants to gain an understanding of how this light-etheric body is conveyed to human beings through the forces of the Moon and through observations of the Moon, I would say through the spiritual lunar observatory—how these etheric forces are imparted to human beings—if one wishes to understand this correctly, one can observe it as we have now attempted to do, from within the cosmos itself, where it is inscribed, where it exists as a fact. But it is also important to allow the human element present in such a truth at various times to take effect on the soul.

[ 8 ] And indeed, never has the human mind played such an intimate and profound role in this descent from pre-earthly existence into earthly life—specifically with regard to the final stage, the clothing of the human being with the etheric body—as it did in the Mysteries of Ephesus. In the Mysteries of Ephesus, the entire ritual dedicated to the goddess of Ephesus—known exoterically as Artemis—was actually aimed at experiencing the spiritual weaving and life within the ether of the world, within the ether of the cosmos. One might even say that when the initiates of the Mystery of Ephesus approached the divine image, they experienced a sensation that intensified to the point of hearing—a sensation that might be expressed as if it were the voice of the goddess herself: “I rejoice in all that bears fruit in the vast ether of the world.”

[ 9 ] It was a profound impression that was made by this expression of the temple goddess’s heartfelt joy in all that grows, sprouts, and shoots forth in the vast ether of the world. And this deep, intimate connection with sprouting and budding was, in particular, something that, like a magical breath, permeated the atmosphere—the spiritual atmosphere—of the Ephesian sanctuary. This mystery was already so arranged, so structured, that one can say: nowhere else has there actually been such a shared experience of the growth of the plant kingdom, of the earth’s sprouting and budding into the plant kingdom, as in Ephesus.

[ 10 ] This led to the fact that, particularly within this Ephesian mystery, the teaching—if I may call it that—could be imparted with special clarity, a teaching aimed specifically at bringing this mystery of the moon, of which I spoke yesterday, to the hearts of the people of Ephesus.

[ 11 ] It was something that everyone experienced as their own personal experience—feeling like a being of light—because it was brought to life so vividly before the Ephesian disciples and initiates: this process of becoming a being of light by passing through the moon. And there was a ritual in Ephesus that went something like this: Whoever was able to allow this ritual to take effect upon them in the place of consecration was truly transported entirely into this process of emerging from the sunlight that transforms the moon. Then a sound reached them, as if it were resonating from the sun: \(J O A\).

[ 12 ] This \(J O A\)—he knew that it made his “I,” his astral body, active. \(J O\)—the “I,” the astral body, and the approach of the light-etheric body in the \(A\)—\(J O A\). Now, as the \(J O A\) vibrated within him, he felt himself as the “I,” as the astral body, and as the etheric body.

[ 13 ] And then it was as if a sound were rising from the Earth, for the human being had been transported into the cosmic realm, as if that which permeated the \(J O A\), \(eh-v\), were rising from the Earth. These were the forces of the Earth that rose up in the \(eh-v\).

[ 14 ] And now he felt, in JehOvA, he felt the whole human being. He sensed a hint of the physical body—which he had only acquired on Earth—in the consonants that accompanied the vowels, which in \(J O A\) signify the “I,” the astral body, and the etheric body. This immersion in the \(Jeh\) \(Ov\) \(A\)—that was what allowed the Ephesian disciple to sense the final steps in descending from the spiritual world.

[ 15 ] But at the same time, this sensing of \(J O A\) was such that one felt oneself to be within the light as this sound \(J O A\). Then one was human: a resonant “I,” a resonant astral body, within a luminous etheric body. Then one was sound within the light. That is what it means to be a cosmic human being.

[ 16 ] And so one is able to perceive what one sees out in the cosmos, just as one is able, through one’s eyes here on Earth, to perceive what happens within the physical surroundings of the Earth.

[ 17 ] Then the Ephesian disciple, carrying within himself this \(J O A\), truly felt as if he had been transported into the lunar sphere. He participated in what could be observed from the moon’s perspective.

[ 18 ] At that time, human beings were still simply human beings in the general sense. They only became men and women upon descending to Earth. But then, human beings felt themselves transported upward into this region of pre-earthly existence—yet one that was approaching the earthly realm. For the Ephesian disciples, this feeling of being transported upward into the lunar sphere became possible in a particularly intimate way. Then they carried within their hearts, within their souls, what they had witnessed—and what resounded to the Ephesian disciple in roughly the following manner:

Being born of the world, you in a form of light,
Empowered by the sun within the moon’s might,

You are gifted with Mars’s creative resonance
And Mercury’s limbs-stirring wings,

Enlightened by Jupiter’s radiant wisdom
And Venus’s love-bestowing beauty—

May Saturn’s age-old spiritual intimacy
Consecrate you to the essence of space and the unfolding of time!

[ 19 ] That was what every Ephesian was deeply imbued with. He considered it the most important thing coursing through his people (the text was written on the blackboard):

[ 20 ] One could certainly say that for those who belonged to the Ephesian Mysteries, it was something like truly feeling human when—to put it somewhat trivially—the meaning contained in these sayings resounded in their ears. For they felt that through this, an awareness dawned upon them of how they are connected to the planetary system through the forces of their etheric body. And this was expressed succinctly. This refers to the etheric body in relation to the universe:

Beings born of the world, you in forms of light,
Empowered by the sun within the moon’s might.

[ 21 ] Now, feeling the power of the moonlight, man is:

Mars bestows upon you the creative power of the sword.

[ 22 ] The sound, which had something creative, something generative about it, echoed from Mars. And that which gave humans the strength in their limbs, enabling them to become beings capable of movement:

And Mercury’s limbs-stirring wings.

[ 23 ] It shines down from Jupiter:

You are enlightened by Jupiter's radiant wisdom.

[ 24 ] It shines over from Venus:

And the beauty that rivals Venus's.

[ 25 ] So that Saturn may then bring together everything that completes the human being, both inwardly and outwardly, and prepares him to descend to Earth, clothe himself in a physical body, and, as this physically clothed being who carries God within himself, continue to live on Earth:

May Saturn’s age-old spiritual intimacy
Consecrate you to the essence of space and the unfolding of time!

[ 26 ] Well, from what I am describing here, you can see that life—spiritual life—in Ephesus was inwardly luminous, full of color. This innerly luminous, colorful life indeed contained what the idea of Easter encapsulates: everything that has ever been known about the true dignity of the human being within the entire cosmos, within the entire universe. And many of those wanderers—I mentioned them yesterday—who went from mystery to mystery in order to allow the whole essence of the mysteries to take effect upon them, many of these wanderers have repeatedly affirmed: Just as brightly and deeply as the harmony of the spheres resounded to them in Ephesus from this perception of the moon’s perspective—where the brightest astral light in the world appeared to them as they sensed it in the sunlight shimmering around the moon, which is spiritualized just as the human being is animated, spiritualized by the astral light— they have not been able to perceive this in other places, at least not with that same joy, with that same inner artistic perception.

[ 27 ] All of this was, of course, connected to that very temple site, which was then set ablaze by the hand of a criminal or a madman. But initiates of the Ephesian Mysteries were, as I mentioned during the Christmas Conference, reincarnated in Aristotle and Alexander. And these individualities then came close to what could still be sensed at that time in the Mysteries of Samothrace.

[ 28 ] Now, an event that appears to be a mere coincidence on the surface is of great spiritual significance in the development of the world. It has already been mentioned among us—in fact, for many years now: When the Temple of Ephesus burned, that was the moment of Alexander the Great’s birth. But as that temple burned, something was indeed taking place.

[ 29 ] Oh, how much had happened over the centuries to those who belonged to this temple! How much spiritual light and wisdom has passed through these temple chambers. And everything that passed through these temple chambers—as the flames burst forth from the temple at Ephesus—has indeed been communicated to the world-ether. So one can say: The continuous Easter celebration in Ephesus, which was enclosed within the temple halls, has since been inscribed—albeit in less clearly perceptible letters—into the entire world dome, insofar as the world dome is ethereal.

[ 30 ] And so it is with many things. Much of what constitutes human wisdom was once enclosed within temple walls. It has escaped from the temple walls, is inscribed in the world-ether, and becomes immediately visible there when a person rises to true imagination. This imagination is, so to speak, the interpreter of the mysteries of the stars. One might say: What was once a temple mystery is inscribed in the world-ether, and one can read it from there through imagination.

[ 31 ] But one can also put it another way, and it amounts to the same thing. One could also say: I stand out on a starry night, gaze at the starry sky, and let its impression work its way into me. And if a person has the ability to do so, what is contained in the forms of the constellations and in the movements of the wandering stars transforms—as it were—into a great cosmic script. And when one reads this cosmic script, something emerges similar to what I explained yesterday regarding the mystery of the Moon. These things can certainly be read in the cosmic script when the stars are no longer merely mathematically and mechanically calculable, but when they become the letters of the cosmic script.

[ 32 ] But now I would like to add the following regarding the further development of this matter. Precisely when approaching the Kabiric mysteries in Samothrace at a time when the ancient mysteries were already in decline—Samothrace was, after all, still a place of remembrance and also a place of cultivation, a place of work, but in general the mystery tradition was already in decline during the time of Alexander— there was a moment when, through the influence of the Kabiric mysteries, something arose for Alexander and Aristotle that was like a recollection of the ancient Ephesian era, which both of them had experienced in a certain century. Once again, the \(J O A\) word resounded there, and once again this resounded:

Being born of the world, you in a form of light,
Empowered by the sun within the moon’s might,

You are gifted with Mars’s creative resonance
And Mercury’s limbs-stirring wings,

Enlightened by Jupiter’s radiant wisdom
And Venus’s love-bestowing beauty

May Saturn’s age-old spiritual intimacy
Consecrate you to the essence of space and the unfolding of time!

[ 33 ] But in this memory—this historical memory of the past—lay a certain power: the power to create something new. And from that moment emanated the power to create something new—but a strange new thing that humanity has paid little attention to. For you must first understand what this new creation, which arose from the collaboration between Alexander and Aristotle, was actually like.

[ 34 ] Take any significant work of poetry or other literature—and you can choose the most beautiful works—take, for my sake, a German translation of the Bhagavad Gita, take Goethe’s Faust, take Iphigenia or anything else you hold in high esteem, and think of the rich, powerful content—let’s say, the rich, powerful content of Goethe’s Faust. And now, my dear friends, through what means is this rich content conveyed to you? Let’s assume it is conveyed to you in the same way it is conveyed to most people. You read Faust at some point in your life. What do you encounter on the physical plane? What is actually on the page? There is nothing on the page but combinations of \(a b c d e\) and so on. Everything through which the great, powerful content of Faust becomes apparent to us is, after all, nothing but combinations of \(a b c d e f\) and so on. If you know the alphabet, there is nothing on the page that does not correspond to one of the twenty-odd letters. From these twenty-odd letters, something has been conjured up on the page that, if you can read, evokes for you the entire rich content of Faust. And you even have some freedom. You are free to find the recitation of \(a b c d e\) and so on terribly boring, to say that this is actually the most abstract thing of all. And yet, this most abstract thing of all, when combined in the right way, yields the entire Faust!

[ 35 ] And now, when that resounding of the lunar worlds returned—in which Aristotle and Alexander recognized the significance of the fire of Ephesus, and how this fire had carried forth into the distant ether of the worlds that which was the mystery of Ephesus—it was then that inspiration arose in these two to establish the world script. However, the cosmic script is not founded on \(a b c d e f\), but rather, just as written language is founded on letters, so too is the cosmic script founded on thoughts. And thus the letters of the cosmic script came into being.

[ 36 ] If I write them down for you, they are just as abstract as \(a b c e d\):

Quantity, i.e., amount
Quality, property
Relation
Space
Time
Location
Action
Suffering

[ 37 ] Here you have a number of concepts. Use these concepts—which Aristotle first demonstrated to Alexander—to accomplish the same thing you learned with \(a b c d\); then, through quality, quantity, relation, space, time, location, action, and suffering—from these, you will learn to read the cosmos.

[ 38 ] Something unusual happened in the logic of schooling during the era of abstract thinking. Just imagine for a moment if, in some school, the custom were not to teach people to read, but—for the sake of argument—only to produce books in which they would always have to learn \(a b c d\) in every possible combination: \(a c, a b, b e\) and so on—but they never got around to using these letters to bring rich content to mind, then that would be the same thing the world did with Aristotle’s logic. In logic, these—what are called categories—are listed. One memorizes them, but doesn’t know what to do with them. That would be like memorizing \(a b c d\) and not knowing what to do with them. Returning to something as simple as the content of Faust expressed in \(a b c d\)—which one simply has to learn—is what reading in the world’s script entails. And, fundamentally speaking, what anthroposophy has produced and can ever produce is experienced through these concepts in the same way that what is read in Faust is experienced through the letters. For all the mysteries of the physical and spiritual worlds are contained in these simple concepts as the world alphabet.

[ 39 ] What has happened in the development of the world is that, in contrast to the earlier form of direct perception—for which the events at Ephesus are still among the most characteristic—something has emerged that began in the time of Alexander, that later developed in a distinctive way throughout the Middle Ages, that is deeply hidden, and that is deeply esoteric. Deeply esoteric is the meaning that lives within these eight—or one could extend them to ten—within these eight or ten simple concepts. And we are actually learning more and more to live within these simple concepts, but we must strive to experience them as vividly in the soul as one experiences the ABCs vividly in the soul when one possesses a richly structured, spirit-filled content.

[ 40 ] Thus you can see how, within these ten concepts—whose inner radiance and power of action must first be revealed anew—lies that which has been a mighty, instinctive revelation of wisdom throughout the millennia. And the time will come when what actually lies as if in a grave—world wisdom, the light of the world—will be rediscovered, when we learn once more to read the cosmos, when we experience the resurrection of that which has been hidden during the interim of human development between the two spiritual epochs.

[ 41 ] We are here, my dear friends, to bring to light once again that which has been hidden. We are here, after all, to shape Easter as an experience for humanity. And just as it has been said on other occasions—that anthroposophy is a Christmas experience—so too is anthroposophy itself, in its entirety, an Easter experience, an experience of resurrection, connected to the experience of the tomb. It is important that, especially during this Easter gathering, we feel—if I may put it this way—the solemnity of the anthroposophical striving, by sensing that we can go today to a spiritual being who may be close to us, standing immediately beyond the threshold, and to whom we say: “Ah, there was a time when humanity was blessed with divine-spiritual revelation, which shone particularly brightly in Ephesus. But now all of that is buried. How can I unearth what lies buried? For one would like to believe that what once was can somehow be found historically, can be found in its tomb.”

[ 42 ] Then the being will reply to us, just as the corresponding being had replied in a similar case long ago: What you seek is no longer here; it is in your hearts, if only you open your hearts in the right way.

[ 43 ] Anthroposophy already lies dormant in people’s hearts. These hearts simply need to be able to truly open up to themselves. And we should feel this; then, with full composure—not as was instinctively the case in ancient times—we will be led back to that wisdom which shone and lived in the mysteries.

[ 44 ] This is precisely what I would like to share with you, especially during this Easter season. For to be imbued with that which, like a festive mood arising from anthroposophy, can be kindled in every human heart that belongs to anthroposophy—in this lies something that truly lifts us up into the spiritual world and that must be connected to the Christmas impulse that was given at Dornach. For this impulse must not remain merely a figment of the imagination, nor an intellectual one; this impulse must be an impulse of the heart; this impulse must not be dry and sober; this impulse must be able to be a solemn one—not out of sentimentality, but out of the matter itself. Just as Aristotle and Alexander made use of the fire of Ephesus when it flared anew in their hearts—though it first flared in the ether outside, from which it conveyed to them once more the mysteries that could then be expressed in the simplest terms—just as the fire of Ephesus could be used in that way, so it is incumbent upon us—and we will already be able to do so—to make use of that which—it may be said in all modesty—has also carried out into the ether, as the flames of the Goetheanum, that which has been intended through anthroposophy and is to be intended in the future.

[ 45 ] But what does this tell us, my dear friends? It tells us that we were able, as part of our annual memorial service around the Christmas and New Year’s season—the very time when misfortune struck us here—to send out a new impulse from the Goetheanum. Why? Because we can feel that what was previously, to a greater or lesser extent, an earthly matter—developed and established as such—has been carried out into the vastness of the worlds by the flames. Precisely because this misfortune has befallen us, we can say, in recognizing the consequences of this misfortune: We now understand that we are not merely to represent an earthly matter, but a matter of the vast etheric world in which the spirit lives. For the cause of the Goetheanum is a matter of the vast ether in which the spirit-filled wisdom of the world lives. It has been carried out into the cosmos, and we may allow ourselves to be permeated by the impulses of the Goetheanum as if they were coming to us from the cosmos.

[ 46 ] Let us take this however we wish; let us take it as a metaphor. But this metaphor conveys a profound truth. And this profound truth is expressed in simple terms by saying: Since the Christmas impulse, anthroposophical work is to be permeated by an esoteric element. This esoteric element is present because what was earthly—through what participated in the physical fire, but as astral light radiating out into the cosmos—has in turn a retroactive effect on the impulses of the anthroposophical movement, provided we are able to receive these impulses.

[ 47 ] Then, if we are able to do this, we will perceive an important link within everything that lives in anthroposophy. And this one important link within it is the anthroposophical Easter spirit—that anthroposophical Easter spirit which can never be convinced that the Spirit dies, but rather that, when it dies through the world, it rises again and again. And anthroposophy must hold fast to the Spirit that rises again and again for eternal reasons.

[ 48 ] Let us take this to heart—let us embrace it as an Easter thought and an Easter feeling. And, my dear friends, we will carry away from this gathering feelings that will give us the courage and strength to work when we find ourselves in a different place.