The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Second Lecture

[ 1 ] The day before yesterday I spoke of how theoretical discussions about karma and repeated earthly lives must remain something lifeless unless one actually incorporates this line of thought into one’s practical outlook on life—that is, views life in terms of karma and repeated earthly lives. The perspective referred to here, however, is one that must be approached with the utmost seriousness. For it can certainly be said: The temptation for people to form ideas about all sorts of karmic connections, about all sorts of things related to repeated earthly lives—this temptation is very great, and the source of illusions in this area is an extraordinarily vast one. And, after all, an investigation along these lines can only truly be undertaken once the spiritual world has, in a certain sense, been opened up to the investigator through the development of the soul.

[ 2 ] In that case, however, the listeners will also demand, specifically for such investigations, those grounds for conviction that may follow from everything else that comes to light in the course of the considerations of such an investigation. One should not, in fact, place any trust in someone who begins to speak of repeated earthly lives without further ado; rather, what is drawn from such occult depths must be corroborated by the presence of other evidence that justifies that trust.

[ 3 ] Now I believe that over the course of the twenty-three twenty-four years during which anthroposophy has been cultivated, enough occult material has been gathered so that today the results of this daring research into karma and repeated earthly lives may be presented to those listeners who have been able to gain confidence through the other areas of spiritual life that have been unfolded over time. Admittedly, there are many here at this very moment who have only recently joined the Society. Yet it would indeed be an obstacle to the Society’s development if we were, so to speak, to start from the very beginning for the newcomers; for on the other hand, we have the great joy and satisfaction that, precisely during this period of fully attended courses, a large number of the oldest anthroposophical friends have also gathered here—anthroposophists who have witnessed nearly the entire course of anthroposophical development. And over time, opportunities must be created so that, within the Anthroposophical Society, those who are still in the early stages of their membership can be introduced to what must be cultivated as the Anthroposophical Society continues to develop.

[ 4 ] I must preface this because I intend to present the reflections I am sharing today—which will serve as the starting point for much of what will follow in the next lectures—more as a statement than as mere information, since some of what is contained therein will indeed seem quite daring. But, my dear friends, human life only appears in its true light when one views it in accordance with its truth—as a continuous process spanning repeated earthly existences. However, serious research in this field—research that is conscious of its responsibility—is by no means easy. For the findings obtained in this area actually contradict, in a certain sense, the ideas people usually hold.

[ 5 ] The fact is that when someone looks at a human life on Earth with all its elements of fate, they notice those blows of fate that they are initially able to grasp—those related to one’s profession, whether external or internal, those related to one’s social status, and the like. It is easy for a person, in regard to the content of their earthly life, to appear to possess qualities that need not be external at all—qualities that may already signify something for the innermost core of their soul being; but when viewed from those depths from which repeated earthly lives must be observed, it is nevertheless necessary to disregard much of what outwardly leaves its mark on a person’s destiny in a single earthly life.

[ 6 ] In particular, one must not imagine that one’s external or internal profession plays a major role in the karma that runs through one’s various earthly lives. Just imagine how even a profession characterized relatively by external factors—say, that of a civil servant or the like—is connected, even outwardly, to a person’s destiny. But for the actual karmic connections, for the actual connections of destiny, what is characterized by this external profession need not have any significance at all. The same is true of one’s inner calling. How easily one is tempted to think, in the case of a musician, that he was—if not a musician again—at least an artist in a previous earthly life. This is by no means always the case; in fact, it is true only in the rarest of instances when one truly investigates these matters. For ongoing karma—the continuous thread of destiny—extends much deeper into the human inner being and pays little attention to external and internal professions; rather, it is concerned far more with the inner powers and resistances of the soul, as well as with the moral connections that can ultimately manifest themselves in every external and internal profession.

[ 7 ] But this is precisely what makes it necessary, in the study of karma and the thread of fate, to examine circumstances in a person’s life that sometimes even seem trivial. I must mention, time and time again, a fact that I have encountered in my own life.

[ 8 ] I was to investigate the karmic connections of a person who had exhibited various peculiarities in life, who had, in fact, fulfilled his life’s purpose and pursued his profession. But from everything he did in his profession—and from what he did, for example, as a philanthropist and the like—nothing emerged to my intuitive eye that pointed to his previous earthly lives. Not that all of this was unrelated to his previous earthly lives; but for my observation, no such indication emerged. One could not discern anything from observing these facts arising from his profession or his philanthropy. Curiously, however, something did emerge in this individual precisely from a minor peculiarity in his life. He was to give a lecture, and always, before he began speaking, he would habitually take out his handkerchief and blow his nose. I have often heard him speak and have never observed anything other than that, before he began to speak coherently, he would take out his handkerchief and blow his nose. He did not do this in conversation, but he always did it when he was required to speak in a coherent manner. This created an image from which radiated the ability to look back into past earthly lives.

[ 9 ] I cite this as a particularly grotesque example. The examples aren’t always so grotesque; but one must have the ability to take a person’s whole being into account if one wants to examine karma in a valid and meaningful way at all. You see, for example, having a certain profession is, upon closer inspection, more or less something that stems from one’s upbringing and so on. In contrast, it is closely tied to a person’s inner mental makeup if they simply cannot help but take out a handkerchief and blow their nose before beginning a speech. That is much more intimately tied to a person’s very nature. But that is, of course, a radical, extreme example. Things are not always like that. But I would like to use this to convey the idea that, as a rule, when investigating karma, what lies on the surface of a person’s life is of no use at all; one must delve into certain intimate aspects—but not those one imagines into existence in an illegitimate way, rather those that lie openly in life.

[ 10 ] Having provided this introduction, I would now like to begin quite openly with what I have to say—naturally, with all the caveats that must always be present in such a case, namely, that everyone may believe or not believe what I have to say, but also with the assurance that the subject I am about to discuss is grounded in the deepest seriousness of spiritual scientific research.

[ 11 ] Such things do not occur either when one approaches research with the intention of conducting it in the same way as a modern laboratory researcher does; rather, research into karma must, in a certain sense, arise from karma itself. I felt compelled to mention this at the end of the new edition of my Theosophy, for among the various strange demands that have been made of me over the course of my life is the suggestion that I submit myself to some psychological laboratory so that the people there can investigate whether the things I say about spiritual science are well-founded. This is, of course, just as ridiculous as if someone were to present mathematical results and, instead of verifying those results, one were to demand that the person undergo examination in a laboratory to determine whether he or she is a genuine mathematician or not. But such absurdities are, after all, considered scholarship today and are seriously demanded. I explicitly mentioned at the end of the new edition of my Theosophy that such experiments can, of course, yield no results, and I also noted that all paths leading to such an endeavor—to the investigation of a concrete occult result—must themselves be prepared in a spiritual and supersensible manner.

[ 12 ] I once had the opportunity to meet a modern physician whom I knew very well from his reputation and his career as an author, and whom I held in high regard. So here, in this instance, I am mentioning the karmic details that led to the corresponding research. It took a long time and was only completed in the last few weeks; it is only now that—if one is a conscientious person—one can speak of it. I am therefore mentioning all the details so that you may see some aspects—not everything, of course—of how things are connected.

[ 13 ] So I got to know such a modern doctor, and in fact, when I first met him, he was with another person. I had known this other person very well for quite some time; she always made a—I wouldn’t say deep, but thorough—impression on me. A profound impression, for the reason that this person took great delight in spending time with people who, to the greatest extent, were concerned precisely with a somewhat superficially understood form of occultism. But this person also took great pleasure in recounting how many of their acquaintances spoke about all manner of occult matters—particularly about those aspects of the occult that relate to what today’s artists, whether lyric poets, epic poets, or playwrights, are supposed to strive for. And this person was surrounded by a kind of—I would say—moral aura. I use the word “moral” to refer to everything connected with the qualities of the soul governed by the will. In the presence of this individual, whom I had actually come to visit, I now encountered the other man, whom I knew—and held in high esteem—for his career as a writer and his work as a physician. And what unfolded during this visit truly left a deep impression, one that inspired me to incorporate the whole experience into the realm of spiritual research.

[ 14 ] Then something very strange happened. It was due to the insight I gained from witnessing the coexistence of these two personalities, and also through the impression that this other personality made on me—whom I had long known from her career as a writer and her work as a physician, whom I held in high regard, and whom I was now seeing in person for the first time—through all of this I gained the strength, though not initially to examine this personality I was getting to know anew in terms of the context of her life and destiny, but she, as it were, cast a light onto the other one, whom I had known for a long time, and it turned out that the other one—not in his last, but in an earlier earthly life—had lived in ancient Egypt and, strangely enough, had been mummified in ancient Egypt, embalmed as a mummy.

[ 15 ] It soon became clear that this mummy still existed. I saw it again somewhere later on, but much later. That was the starting point. But as research was sparked by this figure, whom I had known for a long time, that research, so to speak, radiated outward, and the opportunity arose to investigate the fateful connections of this man’s new acquaintance. And that is when the following came to light.

[ 16 ] While one is usually very easily led from a person’s earthly life back to their last incarnation, in this case intuition led far back into ancient Egypt and clearly presented two personalities before the soul’s eye: a sort of chieftain in ancient Egypt who, in a very profound sense, had attained the ancient Egyptian initiation, but had become somewhat decadent as an initiate—one who, over the course of his life, had begun to take the initiation less seriously, even treating it with a certain degree of derision. The chieftain, however, had a servant who was exceptionally serious. The servant was, of course, not initiated; but both were tasked with embalming mummies and procuring the necessary materials from quite far away.

[ 17 ] Now, the practice of mummification—particularly in ancient Egypt—was an extraordinarily complex process that required intimate knowledge of human nature and the human body. But even those who were rightfully entrusted with embalming mummies were required to possess a deep understanding of the human soul. The chieftain, who had actually been initiated into this craft, gradually began to treat his true calling with a kind of frivolity. Thus it came to pass that he gradually—as one might say in the language of the mysteries—betrayed the things he had received through a kind of initiation to his servant, who turned out to be a man who gradually came to understand the content of the initiation better than the initiate himself. And so the servant in question became a mummy embalsamer, while the other eventually did not even watch anymore, yet naturally claimed for himself everything associated with it in terms of status and social standing. This other one gradually came to a point where he no longer enjoyed much esteem and thereby became embroiled in various life conflicts. The servant, however, who was actually gradually working his way up to a very, very serious outlook on life, was downright moved—strangely and deeply moved—by a kind of initiation that was not a real one, but which lived so instinctively within him. And so a whole series of mummies were embalmed under the supervision and active participation of these two men.

[ 18 ] Time passed. The two people passed through the gate of death, underwent the experiences I would like to discuss next—experiences that, in the supersensible realm, are connected with the development of karma and destiny—and were then both reincarnated into earthly life during the Roman era, specifically around the time when the Roman Empire was founded: during the reign of Augustus; not exactly, but roughly during the age of Augustus.

[ 19 ] As I said, this is meticulous research, as precise as any physical or chemical research can be. I would not be speaking about these things if it hadn’t been for the opportunity that has arisen in recent weeks to discuss them in such a specific way. Now one finds this one, the chieftain—who, little by little, had actually become a frivolous initiate, but who, after passing through the gate of death, experienced this as an extraordinarily bitter earthly trial, with all the aftereffects of such a bitter earthly trial— one finds him again as Augustus’s daughter Julia, who marries Augustus’s stepson Tiberius and leads a life that naturally seemed justified to her, but which was regarded within Roman society at that time as so immoral that she was exiled. The other, the servant who had worked his way up almost to the rank of an initiate—but starting from the very bottom—is reborn in this era as the Roman historian Titus Livius.

[ 20 ] But what is interesting is how Titus Livius came to write history. He embalmed a large number of mummies during the ancient Egyptian period. The souls that were in the bodies of these mummies—precisely these souls—had often been incarnated as Romans, specifically as the seven Roman kings—for the seven Roman kings did indeed exist. If we go back to the time when the two—the chieftain and his servant—were incarnated, we find ourselves in very ancient Egyptian times. And through a certain law that applies specifically to the reincarnation of souls whose bodies have been mummified, these souls were called back to Earth relatively soon. But the karmic connection between the chieftain’s servant—whom I have spoken of—and these souls, whose bodies he embalmed, is so intimate that he must write the history specifically of them—of course, he must also include the other events he did not embalm—but he must write the history of precisely those people whom he embalmed. Thus, Titus Livius becomes a historian.

[ 21 ] Now I would simply like as many of you as possible to pick up Titus Livius’s History of Rome and let Titus Livius’s style sink in, drawing on the knowledge that arises here from the karmic context. You will see that the strangely human intensity and, at the same time, the mythical quality in Titus Livius’s style point toward that insight into human nature which an embalmer can acquire. One only arrives at such a connection when one undertakes such research. But then what emerges is precisely what suddenly sheds light on something. It is difficult to conceive of the origin of Titus Livius’s style—this remarkable style with which Livius, as a historian, “embalsams” the people he describes—for that is ultimately what this style is—it is difficult to conceive of the origin of this style. Light is shed on this style when one points out such connections.

[ 22 ] Well, you see, we have these two personalities once again as Julia and Titus Livius. As Julia and Titus Livius, they now pass through the gate of death once more. Everything that one soul has experienced—essentially having been quite strongly a kind of initiate, yet having distorted this into frivolity; having experienced the bitterness of the aftereffects in the life between death and rebirth; and then, as Julia, having experienced that peculiar fate—look it up— all of this resulted, for the next life that followed the Julia life between death and rebirth, in a strong antipathy toward the Julia incarnation, which became universalized in a remarkable way. One can intuitively sense this individuality in the life between death and rebirth, as if she were constantly crying out: “Oh, if only I had never become a woman, for it was what I accomplished back then in ancient Egypt that led me to this womanhood!”

[ 23 ] One can now trace these individualities. As we enter the Middle Ages, we rediscover Titus Livius as a poet who loved to sing in the middle of the Middle Ages. One is surprised to find him this way, for his outward professions seem entirely unrelated. But the greatest surprises that can befall a person are precisely those that arise from contemplating earthly lives emerging from one another. One finds the Roman historian—with the style that emerged from an understanding of human nature through mummification—in the further development of this style, which possessed great lightness and which is now, as it were, carried aloft in lyrical lightness; one rediscovers Titus Livius as Walther von der Vogelweide.

[ 24 ] Walther von der Vogelweide, who is staying in Tyrol and has many patrons, now has among them a certain patron who is a most remarkable man. A man who was on a first-name basis with all sorts of alchemists—of whom there were dozens upon dozens in Tyrol at the time—who was a lord of a castle, but who was always—as one might say, using modern theatrical terminology—dabbling in all manner of alchemical nonsense, yet in the process learned and discovered an immense amount; who, among other things, derived precisely from this—just as was later the case with Paracelsus in a similar manner—the impulse from his dabbling in alchemical nonsense to pursue all things occult with great intensity. He developed an immensely intense interest in the occult, and this enabled him to rediscover something in Tyrol that at the time was known only through legend: namely, the castle—the mountain castle, the rock castle—which no one else could have recognized because it consisted solely of rock—it was formed from rock, with a cavern inside— the castle of the Dwarf King Laurin. And the demonic nature of the area surrounding the castle of the Dwarf King Laurin made an immensely deep impression on this individual. So that something strange is united within this soul: initiation taken to the point of frivolity; resentment at having been a woman and thereby having been driven into Roman licentiousness and, at the same time, into Roman hypocrisy regarding morality; and intimate knowledge—though only superficial—of all manner of alchemical matters; yet, at the same time, this knowledge expanded into a free understanding of nature’s demons and, more generally, of the spiritual in all of nature. And both—even if this is not mentioned in Walther’s biography, it is nonetheless the case—both Walther von der Vogelweide and this man met quite often at that time. Walther von der Vogelweide experienced many an impulse and much influence from this man.

[ 25 ] Well, you see, here we observe at the same time—which is, so to speak, a karmic law—how these personalities are drawn to one another again and again, how they are called here to Earth time and again, simultaneously, complementing one another, and living out their opposites. And it is, in turn, interesting to observe Walther’s peculiar lyrical style, which really— I would say, seems as though he had thoroughly grown weary of embalming and has turned toward a completely different side of life—the side of life where one deals not with anything dead, but with full, joyful existence—though with a tinge of pessimism as well. Feel the style of Walther von der Vogelweide, and feel the two previous earthly lives within that style. Feel, too, the restless life of Walther von der Vogelweide: it is strikingly reminiscent of the kind of life that unfolds when one spends so long in the company of the dead and many destinies are unloaded into the soul, as was the case with a mummy embalmer.

[ 26 ] And now, moving on. You see, continuing to trace this karmic chain led me back to the same room—but now only intuitively, in my mind—where I had been in the presence of an old acquaintance of mine, whom I also knew to be a mummy—and now I knew: a mummy embalmed by the other—; so the entire line led me back to this room once more. And I found the soul that had passed through the ancient Egyptian embalmer, through Titus Livius, through Walther von der Vogelweide, once again in the modern physician Ludwig Schleich.

[ 27 ] This is how the connections in life emerge in surprising ways. Who, after all, can truly comprehend an earthly life with ordinary consciousness? It can only be understood if one knows what lies at the very core of a soul. Theoretically, many people know that successive earthly lives are stored at the core of the soul. But this only becomes real and concrete when one actually observes it in a specific case.

[ 28 ] The gaze was once again drawn away from this room, for the other figure—who was present there as another mummified being—initially revealed no further clues, or at least none of any great significance. In contrast, the spiritual journey of the old chieftain—who was Julia, the discoverer of Laurin’s enchanted castle—now became clear: that is August Strindberg.

[ 29 ] Now I ask you to take August Strindberg’s entire life and poetry and view them against the backdrop I have just described. Take a look at Strindberg’s peculiar misogyny, which isn’t really misogyny at all, because it stems from all sorts of other underlying factors. Take a look at everything that runs demonically through Strindberg’s writings. Take a look at August Strindberg’s fondness for all manner of alchemical and occult arts and practices—and finally, take a look at August Strindberg’s adventurous life! Then you will see just how sharply this life stands out against the background I have described.

[ 30 ] And if you then read Ludwig Schleich’s memoirs—his relationship with August Strindberg—you will see how this, in turn, plays out against the backdrop of his earlier earthly lives! But a light can flicker up from Ludwig Schleich’s memoirs—a very strange light, I would say, a disconcerting light. The personality I encountered in Schleich—the one I spoke of as having been mummified by Schleich himself in an ancient Egyptian life—is, in fact, the very same one Schleich describes in his memoirs as having brought Strindberg to him, having brought him back. They worked together on the corpse: this soul, which was in that body, is what brought them back together.

[ 31 ] You see, this is how the concepts—which can initially be discussed only in theoretical terms—regarding repeated earthly lives and karma become concrete. But only then does what unfolds in earthly life truly become clear. What is a single human life on Earth, in all its incomprehensibility, if it cannot be viewed against the backdrop of previous earthly lives!

[ 32 ] My dear friends, when I discuss such matters, I have a feeling in addition to the discussion itself. These matters, which have become possible to discuss since the Christmas Conference, require—if they are to be viewed in the proper sense—genuine seriousness, a serious attitude, and a sincere commitment to the anthroposophical movement on the part of the listeners, for they can very easily lead to all sorts of frivolities. But these matters are being raised because it is necessary today for the Anthroposophical Society to be founded on a basis of seriousness and to become aware of its own task within modern civilization.

[ 33 ] Therefore, having laid the groundwork in this way, I would like to speak about the karma of the Anthroposophical Society in the next lecture, which is to take place next Wednesday at 8:30 a.m., and then, in the lecture after that—the date of which I will announce later—to move on to what such reflections on karma can mean for a person who wishes to contemplate the deeper meaning of their own life.