The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Fourth Lecture

[ 1 ] Today I would like to say a few more things as a continuation of what I have remarked on regarding the development of spiritual life in the 19th century. In particular, we will need to consider the role played, on the one hand, by the materialistic worldview, and how attempts were made—as I have already said—to counter the inevitable influx of the materialistic worldview with the spiritual movement of the 19th century; how attempts were made from various quarters of the occultists to save humanity from falling into materialism. On the other hand, we can well combine this with a consideration of what is presenting itself to us these days: a special examination aimed at gaining some insight into the peculiar nature of those forces and powers that manifest themselves outwardly on the physical plane in such a way that they have already cost us so many sessions—which, as I at least assume, have caused you a great deal of headache.

[ 2 ] A connection can be drawn from certain broader perspectives in the intellectual development of the 19th century to these matters that now concern us directly. However, today in particular I will be forced to go into great detail, and I ask you to treat the various statements I have to make with a certain degree of caution right from the start, for the simple reason that these matters concern information which, as you will see, by its very nature can be known to only a very few people at present. Later on, it will become clear that you can find the complete evidence.

[ 3 ] First and foremost, let us once again take as our starting point the fact that the 19th century was the era in which materialism emerged as a worldview in the natural course of human progress; that around the middle of the 19th century was the time when all of humanity was, so to speak, to be tested by the rise of materialism. Materialism was to stand seductively on the horizon of worldview, like Circe, and human inclinations, feelings, and sensibilities were to take on such a form that people, as it were, fell in love with materialism. One can truly say that the people of the 19th century fell in love with materialism.

[ 4 ] On the other hand, we have seen what a great eulogy can be made in praise of materialism. We have had to show that materialism, as a method, has in fact brought about the great achievements of natural science. These great achievements of natural science, with all their technical, economic, and social successes, could not have come about if human mental faculties had not been shaped for the materialistic worldview. Two things came together. On the one hand, the course of human development had to unfold and proceed to the point where, if one went further, a materialistic interpretation of nature was inevitable. It was precisely the honest people who had to arrive at materialism if they continued along certain paths of research that natural science had taken. For materialism was good—good as a research method for observing the mysteries of the sensory world. That was one thing that resulted. The other was that, so to speak, people’s hearts and souls were so attuned that they came to embrace materialism, so that everything seemed to be pushing in that direction. Everything thus came together to test people, as it were, through a materialistic worldview.

[ 5 ] Now, I have already told you that those among the occultists who, in a sense, bear the responsibility for ensuring that humanity does not sink completely into materialism attempted to use mediumship, and I have also shown you that mediumship has led people astray. I have already hinted at one of the most significant ways in which it has led people astray. I said it was so strange that mediums everywhere claimed to be able to convey messages and revelations from the realm of the dead—the realm where people live after death. Now, what was even more remarkable, in addition to everything I have already mentioned, was that these messages, which came through mediums and supposedly originated from the realm of the dead, exhibited a strong bias throughout. You can go through all these messages and you will find that there is a strong bias in these statements by the mediums, particularly regarding the life of the soul after death.

[ 6 ] In important places where the media were used, such demonstrations took place, which deeply troubled the old esotericists—that is, those who did not want to reveal certain occult truths to the public. I can explain to you the reason why they might have been troubled by this in the following words.

[ 7 ] To fully understand this, please read the lecture series I gave some time ago in Vienna: “The Inner Nature of the Human Being and Life Between Death and Rebirth.” It contains very important insights that emerge when one regularly approaches the realm of the dead—when, so to speak, one puts oneself in a position where the dead can speak to one.

[ 8 ] But in many places where the media were used, the revelations were quite different. And above all, if you follow the literature that has accumulated from the messages of the various media, you will come to realize that through the most diverse media—especially where these media were guided by the souls of the living—the accounts have been colored in a highly biased manner. Descriptions of life after death emerged there which, if you compare them with what is stated in the lecture series on life between death and a new birth, are completely false. You will also see that the tendency among the various mediums was to suppress any mention of the fact that there are repeated earthly lives. Wherever the mediums claimed that the dead were speaking to them, they described life after death in such a way that it implied: there could be no repeated earthly lives. One tendency in the development of mediumship—particularly in its most crucial aspects—is to provide false information about life between death and a new birth, specifically information that outright excludes so-called reincarnation. So they wanted to speak through mediums in this way. That is to say, certain people who, by virtue of their particular orientation, pursue precisely this tendency, wanted to use the mediums to bring such revelations to the public that suggest there are no repeated earthly lives. They thus sought to combat the doctrine of repeated earthly lives through the mediums. This was a very striking fact—one that terrified the most right-wing occultists the most, since they themselves had helped bring about the entire phenomenon of mediumship and the consequences it entailed, which served a particular agenda rather than the unbiased truth.

[ 9 ] All these things were possible because there was a sufficiently pronounced tendency toward materialism. There was, in fact, a strong human tendency toward materialism. Now, no form of materialism as a worldview is compatible with what is presented as a spiritual research method in the cycle of life between death and a new birth. But one can be a materialist in one’s way of thinking and still believe what various mediums have said about life after death. For this is, in essence, merely a kind of disguised materialism that is ashamed of being materialism and therefore uses mediums to learn something about the spiritual world. Materialism, then, had to be reckoned with, and those who truly reckoned with materialism fared best in this regard.

[ 10 ] Now, on top of all this, there is something else. Over the course of the 19th century, great confusion had arisen—even among those who knew something about the spiritual worlds—regarding a certain matter about which, if any spiritual movement is to continue at all, it is absolutely essential that clarity be established. The confusion was that people constantly conflated Ahriman and Lucifer. They could no longer distinguish between them. They had an evil principle and the representative of evil, but they neither wanted nor were able to make a clear distinction between them. Just recall what I explained at Easter: how Goethe himself was no longer able to draw a distinction between Ahriman—whom he called Mephistopheles—and Lucifer. They cannot be distinguished, since Mephistopheles, in Goethe’s portrayal, is a mixture, a hybrid between Ahriman and Lucifer. Throughout the 19th century, people lacked the capacity to distinguish between the representatives of these spiritual currents—between Ahriman and Lucifer. Today I will only be able to say a few things in passing; later I will be able to elaborate further, and then the evidence will also become clear.

[ 11 ] When it comes to gaining clarity about the spiritual world, much depends on being able to distinguish correctly between Ahriman and Lucifer. That is why this strict distinction must be made—a distinction that even underlies our figurative representation, where you will find both powers depicted: both Ahriman and Lucifer. A great deal, therefore, depends on being able to distinguish clearly between these two powers, Ahriman and Lucifer. If one does not know how to distinguish them well, this leads to a peculiar kind of confusion in Spiritual Science. This can be characterized as follows: if one mixes them up, as Goethe did in *Kuddelmuddel* with Ahriman and Lucifer in *Mephistopheles*, there is a constant danger that Ahriman will continually appear in the form of Lucifer. One is then unsure of whom one is dealing with. One does not know whether one is dealing with Ahriman or with Lucifer in the form of Ahriman. Ahriman wants to deceive us—to deceive us through the materialistic worldview. But the materialistic worldview would not lead to the consequence mentioned yesterday if one would only go far enough and hold fast to the thread of thought. Without this far-reaching thinking, one cannot come to terms with materialism. But if one mixes them up—Ahriman and Lucifer—into a jumble, then what happens is that one accepts what deceives one as an Ahrimanic image, as an Ahrimanic world, because Lucifer comes to Ahriman’s aid, and one then develops a certain longing to accept certain errors as truths.

[ 12 ] This remarkable fact has become abundantly clear: errors that could really only flourish in the age of materialism—one might say, in the age of Ahriman’s seduction—are tolerated because Lucifer is working from within. Ahriman interferes with our perception of external phenomena and deceives us about them. But we would see through his tricks if Lucifer did not awaken certain longings within us, whipping up precisely such materialistic mental images in our worldview.

[ 13 ] Well, that was a situation that existed at one point during the 19th century. People found themselves in that position, and anyone who wanted to could exploit that situation to their advantage. So anyone who saw through the situation could come along and develop some kind of one-sided tendency—that is, some kind of left-wing path. He would not have been able to do so as effectively if humanity in the 19th century had not been in a situation where it was easily seduced and tempted by the confusion created by Ahriman and Lucifer.

[ 14 ] Thus it came to pass that even those with a fundamentally materialistic disposition had, in their worldview, enough of a “Luciferic” element within them, so to speak, that they ultimately did not believe in materialism, but instead sought a spiritual worldview within materialism itself. Imagine that a certain type of person could emerge in the 19th century—one whose mind is entirely materialistic in disposition, who thinks entirely in materialistic terms, but whose heart yearns for the spiritual. Where this is the case, the person in question will seek the spiritual within the material world, and will strive to give the spiritual itself a materialistic form.

[ 15 ] If, however, there is some individuality behind such a personality—one that sees through the whole thing—then this individuality has a particularly easy time of it with such a personality. For this individuality can then, if it so desires, manipulate this person in such a way that he leads others to view the spiritual in a materialistic light, and thus things are accomplished that are designed to deceive people. This works best when done at the right moment—when one conveys truths to people, opening the door for them to the very things they long for. In this way, certain spiritual truths could be brought to humanity, and a one-sided tendency in a certain direction could be achieved by, on the one hand, presenting a certain number of truths with a materialistic slant, yet still providing truths; and then, on the other hand, mixing in something at a specific point that was bound to lead to error—but could not be easily detected—and thus was bound to lead to error.

[ 16 ] You see, something like this happened during the writing of Sinnett’s *Esoteric Buddhism*. This book was written by Sinnett. Behind him, however, is the one he calls his “inspirer,” whom we know as the later mask of a Mahatma individuality. Sinnett was a journalist and was thus fully immersed in the materialistic tendencies of the 19th century; we are therefore dealing with a personality whose mind was entirely materialistically inclined, yet the longing for a spiritual world was also present within him. He thus had the ideal predisposition to seek the spiritual world in the form of materialism, and so it came to pass that the individuality—which had an interest in using materialism in a spiritual way to achieve specific purposes—had an easy time developing, within Sinnett’s “Esoteric Buddhism,” a seemingly spiritual teaching with a distinctly materialistic tendency,

[ 17 ] Now you might say: “But Sinnett’s ‘Secret Buddhism’ is not a materialistic doctrine!”—The fact that people fail to notice this is precisely the point! The fact that the matter is so veiled and so concealed—that is precisely what matters, and it can only be understood if one accepts the premises I have just laid out. Of course, the structure of the human being, the doctrine of karma and reincarnation—these are things that are true. But there is an intimate connection between the materialistic aspect and all these truths. A connection between the true spiritual worldview and something that is materialistic in the most eminent sense exists in Sinnett’s book *Esoteric Buddhism*, but it was not easily discerned because there was hardly anyone who could see clearly that something absolutely materialistic had crept into the very heart of a spiritual teaching. Something that was materialistic—not merely in the eyes of the outer human intellect, but also materialistic in relation to the spiritual worldview, in relation to what can be perceived as spiritual by spiritual insight—that is the teaching given in *Secret Buddhism* regarding the eighth sphere.

[ 18 ] These are, therefore, teachings that possess a high degree of accuracy, yet into which this doctrine of the eighth sphere is woven as an eminently materialistic delusion. Indeed, this doctrine culminates in the assertion that the eighth sphere is the Moon. This assertion is found in Sinnett’s *Esoteric Buddhism*. As you know, it is precisely because of its journalistic qualities—the fine style in which Sinnett’s *Esoteric Buddhism* is written—that it has reached an immensely wide audience and won over many hearts. They have now taken up not the actual teaching about the eighth sphere, but the strange assertion made by Sinnett: that the Moon is the eighth sphere.

[ 19 ] Now this “Secret Buddhism” by Sinnett was available. We know that it was written at a time when Blavatsky, following all the events I have described to you, had already been driven in the one-sided direction of the Indian occultists—those left-leaning occultists who had their own special agendas. That is why “Secret Buddhism” includes the doctrine of the human constitution, karma, and reincarnation. So it was written in opposition to those who wanted to eliminate the doctrine of reincarnation. From this you can also see the intensity of the struggle.

[ 20 ] She, Blavatsky, was in contact with American spiritualists who wanted to do away with the doctrine of reincarnation. Mediumship was the means, and so these mediumistic forms were adopted. Since she rebelled, she was driven out and fell more and more into the hands of the Indians. She was driven into the hands of the Indians. From then on, an opposing current was attempted, and, one might say, a struggle ensued between “Americanism” and “Indianism” with regard to the occult. On the one hand, there was an absolute tendency to eliminate the doctrine of repeated earthly lives, and on the other hand, there was a tendency to bring this doctrine into the world, but in a way that took into account the materialistic tendencies of the 19th century.

[ 21 ] This could be done by interpreting the doctrine of the eighth sphere in the way it is presented in Sinnett’s *Esoteric Buddhism*. On the other hand, there are a certain number of facts that are perhaps important enough to at least allude to, because my intention with these remarks is not to frighten you, but to enlighten you regarding the spiritual perspective from which we are speaking.

[ 22 ] Because Sinnett’s *Esoteric Buddhism* was written in such a way that it contained the fabricated doctrine of the eighth sphere, two difficulties arose. One difficulty was the one that H.P. Blavatsky herself had created. She knew that what Sinnett had written there was incorrect. On the other hand, however, she was at the mercy of those who wanted this false teaching to be disseminated among humanity. Therefore, she attempted—as you can read in her *Esoteric Doctrine*—to correct, in a certain way, precisely this view of the eighth sphere and everything connected with it. But she did so in a way that only served to confuse people even more, and thus a certain discrepancy arose between Sinnett’s *Esoteric Buddhism* and Blavatsky’s *Esoteric Doctrine*. Blavatsky made corrections in a way that was actually intended to reinforce the one-sided tendency of the left-leaning Indian occultists. For she attempted—in a very peculiar way, as we shall see—to shed a little more light on the truth as opposed to error. She therefore had to create a counterbalance once again. For from the standpoint of the Indian occultists, it would have been very dangerous to allow the truth to come to light in this way.

[ 23 ] To create this counterbalance—as we will gradually come to understand—she took a unique path. In doing so, she created the counterbalance by, on the one hand, drawing closer to the truth of the eighth sphere than Sinnett did. But on the other hand, in *The Secret Doctrine*, she launched a vitriolic tirade against everything that constitutes Judaism and Christianity, and wove these into a certain doctrine concerning the nature of Yahweh. In doing so, she attempted to offset on the one hand what she had accomplished on the other, so that the Indian current of occultism would not suffer too much harm. She knew that such truths do not remain theoretical or without effect, unlike other theories that relate to the physical plane. These theories penetrate the general life of the soul and color its sensations and feelings. After all, they were designed to steer souls in a certain direction. It is as if there were an inextricable island of error within.

[ 24 ] Of course, H.P. Blavatsky did not know that the driving forces behind the two had an interest in pursuing a specific purpose—namely, fostering this particular kind of error rather than the truth; to foster a kind of error that was favorable to the materialist current of the 19th century—an error that could only arise in the flood of materialism. That is one side of the story.

[ 25 ] On the other hand, even this matter made a great impression. Sinnett’s *Esoteric Buddhism* and, to a certain extent, Blavatsky’s *Esoteric Doctrine* made a great impression, particularly on those who were genuinely seeking the spiritual world. And that, in turn, naturally alarmed those who had reason to fear that such an occult movement with Eastern overtones might ever gain traction.

[ 26 ] There are now quite a number of highly misguided polemics directed against H.P. Blavatsky, against Sinnett, against the Theosophical Movement, and so on. But among the various polemics that have arisen over time against the Theosophical Movement, there are also those that originate from experts on the subject—albeit one-sided experts. Anglican spiritual life had a tendency to suppress as much as possible anything of an Oriental nature and to prevent the doctrine of repeated earthly lives from becoming widely known among the people.

[ 27 ] Undoubtedly, among those who opposed Eastern teachings on the grounds that they posed a threat to Christian culture in Europe were Christian esotericists. From this perspective, European occultists—esoteric Christians who were close to the High Church faction—opposed these teachings. And from this side, demonstrations took place that were intended to repel what was perceived as an Eastern movement originating with H.P. Blavatsky and Sinnett, while at the same time cultivating a form of esotericism in the wider world that was designed, in particular, to obscure the doctrine of repeated earthly lives. The interest of this group—which did not wish to reckon with the doctrine of repeated earthly lives, even though it had to be presented—was to incorporate a certain current into the form of Christianity to which people in Europe were accustomed. Thus, a path was taken that was similar to Sinnett’s.

[ 28 ] Now I must again expressly note that those who made the relevant preparations were probably not fully aware that they were instruments of the individuality standing behind them. Just as Sinnett knew nothing of the actual intentions of those who stood behind him, so too did those close to the High Church know little of what lay behind it. But they knew that what they were doing was bound to make a great impression on the occultists, and that determined them to promote the other movement, which seeks to eradicate the doctrine of repeated earthly lives.

[ 29 ] If, in light of these preliminary remarks, we examine what is supposed to express the specific error found in Sinnett’s work, we see that it is the doctrine that the eighth sphere manifests itself primarily in the Moon, and that the Moon, with its influences and effects on human beings, represents the eighth sphere. Stated in this form, it is an error. That is the crux of the matter. If one is to investigate the influences of the Moon and proceeds from Sinnett’s premise, one finds oneself in a serious error that stems from a materialistic worldview and which cannot be readily discerned. What was necessary if one wished to uphold the truth? It was necessary to point out the true facts regarding the Moon in contrast to the erroneous portrayal found in Sinnett’s *Esoteric Buddhism*.

[ 30 ] Now please read through my *Outline of Esoteric Science*. My task was to describe how the Moon is driven out of the Earth. I took special care to describe this emergence of the Moon with particular clarity. Here, in the face of error, it was necessary to point to the truth. It was therefore necessary, in contrast to the Indian tradition, to clearly describe the Moon’s function in the Earth’s evolution. That was the one thing that had to be done in my *Esoteric Science*.

[ 31 ] The other thing that had to happen will become clear to you when you consider how the people mentioned last—who were also under a certain leadership—behaved, and who did not want the doctrine of repeated earthly lives, which they believed would alter the form of Christianity as they are accustomed to it in Europe and America, to be accepted as truth among humanity. They have taken a particular path. We can study this path clearly if we have a mental image of how these occultists set to work to refute Sinnett’s *Esoteric Buddhism* on their own terms. Such occultists, who were close to the established church, set out to refute Sinnett’s *Esoteric Buddhism* and Blavatsky’s *Esoteric Doctrine*.

[ 32 ] Compared to what is written in Sinnett’s book about the eighth sphere, a great deal of good has actually come of it, for it has been pointed out very clearly from this side that Sinnett’s statements regarding the eighth sphere and the Moon are incorrect. At the same time, however, this has been linked to another teaching: namely, it has been stated from this perspective that human beings are not connected to the Moon in the way Sinnett described, but in a different way. Although this different way was not explicitly stated there, it was evident that these people had gained some insight into the nature of the Moon’s emergence, as I have described it in my *Esoteric Science*. But now these people emphasized the following point particularly strongly. They said: The Earth was never in connection—and certainly not humankind—with the other planets of the solar system, so that humankind could never have lived on Mercury, Venus, Mars, or Jupiter. — From this perspective, it was thus strongly emphasized that there is no connection between humankind and the other planets of the solar system. But this is the best way to spread yet another error into the world and to cast the greatest darkness over the doctrine of reincarnation. The other error—the error of Mr. Sinnett—even advocates the doctrine of reincarnation in a certain sense, but from a materialistic perspective. This error, however—which consists in claiming that human beings have never had anything to do with Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and so on during their earthly evolution—was not propagated by those who published it, but by those who were behind it. They influenced human souls in such a way that these souls could never truly believe in reincarnation in earnest. Therefore, this group strongly emphasized that human beings had never had anything to do with anything other than the Earth, and had never had anything to do with the planets of our solar system.

[ 33 ] If we now consider human beings as they are between birth and death, you can imagine that, in terms of evolution, they are under the influence of the spirits of form. This is also described in *The Secret Science*. But if you then consider the life from death to the next birth, something essential must be taken into account. Namely, that the sphere of influence of these spirits of form is, so to speak, divided into seven sections, and of these seven sections, only one is actually assigned to Yahweh, and that pertains primarily to the life between birth and death. The other six govern life between death and a new birth.

[ 34 ] This can only be discovered by tracing life between death and a new birth. Just as Yahweh is concerned with the Earth and even went so far as to follow the moon in order to paralyze certain aspects of the Earth’s development from there, so too are the other form spirits concerned with the other planets. But this must be veiled and concealed if one does not wish to teach people the concept of repeated earthly lives; and this concealment must be carried out in practice—it must be done in such a way that people do not become aware of this secret I have just mentioned. For if they are distracted from a true contemplation of the life between death and a new birth, they will come to regard the life between birth and death without this secret and allow themselves to be told by mediums as if there were a being that merely continued this earthly life.

[ 35 ] There is an immense amount of calculation involved in everything that happens in this field. For, of course, the occultist who undertakes such a thing—if he belongs to the Left-Hand Path—knows in which direction he must steer his thoughts in order to direct his emotions in that same direction and to distract people from certain secrets so that they do not come to light.

[ 36 ] This came from that side, and you can trace it in the literature. There you will often find the assertion that human beings have nothing to do with the other planets in our solar system—but what lies behind that is: nothing to do with the guiding spirits of these planets in our solar system. This had been strongly emphasized from this perspective so that people would never develop ideas that lead them to accept the plausibility of the doctrine of reincarnation. And that, you see, was now the other task: to present the truth as opposed to error from this perspective. If you look up *An Outline of Esoteric Science*, you will find that this point is also sharply emphasized: how human beings must leave Earth to spend part of their lives on other planets. In *Esoteric Science*, this is clearly elaborated: on the one hand, the relationship to the Moon, and on the other, the relationship to the other planets.

[ 37 ] What these people sought to achieve can be briefly described as follows: Once again, the materialistic worldview is being used—even by these people. For, consider this: if you present the matter as I have in my *Secret Science*, then you assign a role to the other planets in the context of Earth’s evolutionary process and their relationship to our Earth! The other planets are also part of Earth’s evolution; they belong to it. For the materialist, the planets float around in space as mere material blocks. One had to go back to their spiritual essence—back to the spirits of the planets—by describing the functions they serve in the spiritual development of humanity.

[ 38 ] So you see how, as a spiritual movement, we were, so to speak, caught between two currents, one of which sought to distort the truth about the Moon, and the other to distort the truth about the planets. That was the situation. These facts were certainly evident at the end of the 19th century. H. P. Blavatsky and Sinnett sought to distort the truth about the Moon, while the others, who also sought to distort the truth, sought to distort the connection between the planets and the Earth’s evolution. Do not think it is easy to be caught between two such currents; for we are dealing here with occultism, and occultism means that a greater power is required to grasp its truths than to grasp the ordinary truths of the physical plane. Consequently, however, there is also a greater power of deception at work, which must be seen through. On the one hand, this distortion obscures the truth about the Moon, and on the other, the truth about the planets. This is not easy to see through, because a greater counterforce is required, which one must apply in order to see through the deception. Thus, one was caught between two errors that had been fabricated in favor of materialism. On the one hand, one had to contend with materialism originating from the Eastern tradition—the very tradition that fabricated the story about the moon in order to introduce the Eastern doctrine of reincarnation. The concept of reincarnation was, of course, correct; but to what extent a very significant concession was made to materialism through so-called “Esoteric Buddhism,” we shall yet see. On the other hand, there was a desire to preserve a particular form of Catholic esotericism against the onslaught of the Indian movement, in order thereby to make all that which is spiritual—and which relates to the evolution of the entire planetary system—disappear into materialism all the more completely. Wedged in between was that which Spiritual Science is called upon to do. This was the situation we faced. Powerful forces were at work everywhere, seeking to bring one or the other of the currents—as I have characterized them—to the fore.

[ 39 ] The point now is to show how this distorted doctrine about the Moon is a very special concession to materialism, and how the correction that H. P. Blavatsky made, actually made matters worse, because on the one hand she corrected Sinnett’s communications with great occult talent—which Sinnett lacked—but on the other hand she employed specific methods that were all the more likely to perpetuate the error.

[ 40 ] First of all, it is a matter of recognizing to what extent Sinnett’s doctrine of the eighth sphere is erroneous. You must adhere to the corrected doctrine of the evolution of the Earth in its entirety—that is, the doctrine of the progression through the Saturn, Sun, and Moon stages of development, and then through the Earth stage. You must remember that the ancient Moon was composed in a fundamentally different way than the Earth. The actual mineral kingdom did not emerge until the Earth era, and what constitutes the sensory world of the physical plane is entirely permeated by the mineral. You see nothing in the plant, animal, and human kingdoms other than what is imprinted upon them as mineral. Your entire body is permeated by the mineral. That which is not mineral—the lunar, the solar—exists within them only in an occult sense. One sees only the mineral, the earthly. This must be borne in mind when, starting from what the human being is now on Earth, one seeks to answer the question: What in the human being is the legacy of the ancient Moon?

[ 41 ] As you can see, we have been preparing this entire line of thought for quite some time. So now we must say: The old lunar human is already present within this human being, but in such a way that we must not create any mental images of anything mineral in him. So, when you look into the eyes of the Earth human in such a way that you see only his mineral aspect, you must create a mental image of the Moon human within him. But this Moon human has nothing mineral about him; therefore, he cannot be seen with physical eyes. You can only perceive him if you see him with the spiritual eye. Perhaps I could illustrate this better by hatching the Moon human into the picture. Certain limbs are based on a lunar form. It is there inside, but this becomes clear only to a clairvoyant gaze. Of course, what is inside was present on the ancient Moon. But just remember how it was perceived on the ancient Moon: it was perceived through imaginative insight. They were undulating, billowing images. You can still find them today; but they had to be perceived—at least back then—through atavistic clairvoyance. The ancient lunar human could only be perceived through atavistic clairvoyance. Back then, this was the normal way of seeing. After all, everything connected with this ancient lunar development can only be perceived through imagination, through the old visionary clairvoyance. The Moon Man can never again be formed out of the mineral earth; he can only be formed out of the Moon as perceived through imaginative clairvoyance. Thus, we must also create a mental image of the ancient Moon era, in which the entire environment—just as our environment, that is, plants, animals, rivers, and mountains, is visible to the physical eye—was visible to the imaginative clairvoyance of the Moon Men.

[ 42 ] Now we know, of course, that the forces inherent in this ancient Moon reappear, repeat themselves in the Earth’s evolution, and must reappear. However, as I have shown in *The Secret Science*, the Earth’s evolution would have had to come to an end if these lunar forces had not later been brought to fruition. They could not sustain themselves within the Earth’s forces. And why not? Consider that the entire Earth had to incorporate the mineral kingdom; the Earth had to, so to speak, mineralize itself. During the time when the Moon was on Earth, the lunar force was still present within it. But this force had to emerge, and so the Moon had to separate itself from the Earth. I have described all of this in *The Secret Science*. It had to leave because it could not have survived within the mineralized Earth—that is to say, human beings could not have developed as they did. But think carefully: I have told you that this Moon can only be perceived through imaginative clairvoyance. So if you consider how human beings developed as earthly beings and were predisposed to perceive the world through their physical senses, you will understand that they could never have seen the Moon’s departure. The Moon’s departure—and indeed its presence outside the Earth—would have been perceptible only through clairvoyance. Human nature was such that one could have seen the entire moon, as it moved out, only through clairvoyance, and that the effects which would then have emanated from it could only have been those ancient lunar influences that acted upon human beings in such a way as to evoke, among other things, imaginative clairvoyance within them.

[ 43 ] Just imagine the situation humanity faced back then! It faced the possibility that “humanity” could come into being, that the soul could descend from the planets, and so on. But the Moon would have functioned as a Moon, and it would have functioned in such a way that the forces with which human beings descended would have been the same forces as those of the ancient Moon that preceded the Earth. No one other than those who had developed visionary clairvoyance would ever have seen this Moon.

[ 44 ] As a material consequence of this process—this emanation of the moon’s forces—something else came into being. I have already explained to you the relationship that Yahweh has with the Moon. What happened was that, through this connection between Yahweh and the Moon, the Moon also became material, mineral in nature—but with a much coarser materiality than that of the Earth. What can be seen today as the physical Moon—which implies that the Moon has a mineral character—can thus be traced back to the act of Yahweh; it can be traced back to the fact that pieces were added to the ancient Moon, which were placed there by Yahweh. This is the product of Yahweh.

[ 45 ] As a result, however, the ancient lunar forces have also been paralyzed and now operate in an entirely different way. Had the Moon remained unmineralized, its forces would have acted in such a way that, when the Moon shone, it would always have evoked ancient, atavistic clairvoyance in human beings, or it would have influenced the will in such a way that people would have become sleepwalkers in the most extreme sense. This has been paralyzed by the fact that the Moon, too, has become mineralized. Now the old forces can no longer develop in this way.

[ 46 ] This is a very important truth, an immensely important truth, for now you realize that the Moon had to be mineralized precisely so that it would no longer function as a “moon” in the old sense. So when one speaks of the Moon as a repetition of the old Moon, one must speak of a celestial sphere that is not visible to the physical eye, one that pertains to the spiritual world—even if only the subconscious spiritual world, which is visible to visionary clairvoyance. One must therefore speak of something spiritual when referring to the repetition of the old Moon. And that which is mineral in the Moon has been added to the spiritual. This is not part of it when one speaks of the Moon in the old sense.

[ 47 ] So how did one deal with 19th-century materialism? After all, people wouldn’t believe that behind the material moon lies precisely the important remnant of the old, non-mineralized moon. They simply wouldn’t believe it. So a concession was made to materialism. One considered only the materialized, physical Moon. Thus, Sinnett omitted the spiritual aspect specifically in the case of the Moon. He merely stated—you can look it up in *Esoteric Buddhism*—that the Moon possesses a much coarser materiality than the Earth. —It does, and indeed it must. But he completely omitted the fact that the occult, which I have hinted at to you, lies behind it. He thus made the concession of speaking only of the Moon’s materiality. Yet this leaves out of consideration the spiritual aspect that lies behind the Moon. And that does not belong to the Earth; it is much closer to the ancient Moon than to the Earth.

[ 48 ] This fact was completely obscured, and that has enormous consequences. For by doing so, Sinnett has cast a completely false light on a true point—namely, that the Moon has something to do with the eighth sphere—and has distorted it in an incredibly cunning way. For he has omitted the spiritual aspect of the Moon—namely, that the eighth sphere, of which the Moon is presented as the representative, is that which lies behind the Moon—and he has treated what was given as a corrective, intended to paralyze the eighth sphere, as if it were the eighth sphere itself. The material aspect is present in the Moon to paralyze the eighth sphere, to render it ineffective.

[ 49 ] People overlook how the eighth sphere would function if the material element were removed from the Moon. The entire nature of the human soul on Earth would be different, and the fact that it is not is due to the circumstance that a certain coarser materiality has been incorporated into the Moon. Sinnett calls the very thing that renders the eighth sphere ineffective—namely, materiality—the eighth sphere itself, while concealing what the eighth sphere actually is: the ancient lunar forces. This is a trick often used in occultism: saying something that is essentially true, but phrasing it in such a way that it is, in fact, completely false—forgive the contradiction! It is wrong to say that the material aspect of the Moon is the eighth sphere, because it is precisely the healer of the eighth sphere. But it is entirely correct that the Moon is the eighth sphere, because it is truly up there in the Moon, because the eighth sphere is centered in the Moon, because it lives within it. And now we have reached the point where we can describe in greater detail than before what the eighth sphere really is, and how it is so intimately connected with the spiritual sphere of nineteenth-century development.

[ 50 ] I will continue from this point tomorrow.