The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Eighth Lecture

[ 1 ] In the introductory lecture, I attempted to explain how, through the method of knowledge cultivated by anthroposophy, human beings are to be understood in their totality—in their entirety—as body, soul, and spirit. I also sought to show that one can only arrive at an inner understanding of healthy and diseased states in the human being by taking the whole nature of the human being into account; and how, by coming to know the real relationships between what takes place within the human being and the external processes and substantial conditions in nature, one can thereby also succeed in establishing a direct bridge between the pathological and the therapeutic.

[ 2 ] But now we will proceed to substantiate in detail what was stated in general terms last time. Above all, it will be essential to correctly grasp how a process of breakdown takes place in the human organism, and how, on the other hand, a process of rebuilding is also constantly taking place. In line with the last lecture, we must distinguish in the human being between the outer physical organism, which is perceptible through the external senses, and whose manifestations can be grasped by the intellect through sensory perceptions. In addition to this physical body—in the sense in which I explained this last time—we must distinguish a first supersensible body within the human being: the etheric or Life-Body. These two constituent elements of the human being as a whole serve to build up the human organism. The physical body is continually renewed as it expels its substances. The etheric body, which contains within itself the forces of growth and the capacity for nourishment, is, in its overall constitution, something we can visualize when we observe the growing, blooming plant world in spring; for plants, just like human beings, contain an etheric or Life-Body. We thus have, in these two organizational components of the human being, a progressive, constructive development.

[ 3 ] Since human beings are sentient beings, they also possess—and we need not take offense at the terms themselves, but simply see what they convey—an astral body within them, which is essentially the mediator of sensations, the bearer of the inner, sentient being. This astral body, however, no longer contains forces of construction; it carries within it forces of decay. Just as human nature, so to speak, sprouts and grows through the etheric body—or call it what you will, but there it is—so what sprouts and grows is continually broken down by the astral body. And it is precisely through this that a soul-spiritual activity exists within the human organism: the physical-etheric is continually being broken down. It is a grave mistake to believe that the spiritual-soul aspect of the human being is in a state of construction; and that construction—the progressive development—ultimately reaches a point—say, in the nervous system or the like—where it becomes the bearer of the spiritual-soul aspect. That is not the case. Once—and all signs indicate that this will happen soon—our deeply admirable scientific investigations continue along the path they are already on, it will become clear that what is essential in the nervous principle is not a constructive force; the constructive element in the nervous system exists solely to enable the nerves to exist at all. But the nervous process is in a state of continuous, albeit slow, dissolution; it is that which is in a state of decay and thereby, in a sense, as the physical dissolves, makes way for the spiritual-psychic.

[ 4 ] This is even more true of the actual “I” organization, through which human beings rise above all other natural beings in their environment on Earth. The “I” organization is, in essence, always destructive; it asserts itself most strongly where destruction is taking place within the human being.

[ 5 ] Thus, when we look into this marvelous structure of the human organism, we find in every single organ a process of building up, through which the organ serves growth and progressive development, and a process of breaking down, through which it serves regressive physical development—but thereby precisely facilitates the establishment of the spiritual-soul aspect within the human being. And as I said last time: The state of equilibrium between building up and breaking down, which exists in a specific way for every organ in the human being, can be disrupted. The constructive process can become excessive, and then we are dealing with pathological conditions. When we look into the human being in this way—I can only explain these things initially in somewhat abstract terms; they will be expressed more concretely later on—and when we proceed conscientiously with scientific responsibility, so that we do not merely speak in general, clichéd terms: “There is building up and breaking down”—but if we then truly study each individual organ with the same scientific conscientiousness that we have learned from scientific observations—which have today reached such a high degree of perfection—then we look into those states of equilibrium that must exist for the individual organs and have the opportunity to gain an insight into the healthy human being. If, in one direction or another—whether toward synthesis or toward breakdown—the balance of the organs is disturbed, then we are dealing with some form of pathology in the human organism.

[ 6 ] Now, however, we must consider how the human organism relates to the external world surrounding it—the three kingdoms of nature: the mineral, plant, and animal kingdoms—from which we must, after all, derive our remedies. If one directs one’s attention comprehensively to the inner states of equilibrium within the human being, as I have outlined, then one sees how, in every respect, the human organism overcomes what exists outside it in the three kingdoms of nature. Let us take the simplest example: the states of warmth in the human organism. Nothing from external states of warmth may, so to speak, find an unaltered continuation within the human organism. When I observe the manifestations of warmth in the external world, I know that warmth raises the temperature of things in the external world. We say: Heat permeates things. If we, as human beings, were likewise permeated by heat—if we were, so to speak, a thing for heat—then heat would be pathogenic for us. Only when, through the intensity and quality of our organism, we are able to immediately receive every thermal process exerted upon us internally within the organism and transform it into an internal process—only then are we, as human organisms, in a state of health. We are harmed by heat or cold the moment external heat or cold affects us and we are unable to immediately receive within our organism what external heat or cold is.

[ 7 ] When it comes to heat and cold, virtually everyone can easily understand this. However, the same is true of all other natural processes. Only a careful study, sharpened by spiritual insight, leads to the realization that every process taking place in nature is transposed, transformed, and metamorphosed within the human organism, so that in our inner organization we are continually overcoming what exists in the earthly realm around us. If we now consider the entire inner organization of the human being, we will say: if the human being’s inner power to internally transform the external events and processes that continually affect him—even when, for example, he consumes food—is diminished, then what enters the human being from the outside acts as a foreign body, and the human being becomes, so to speak—if I may speak crudely and trivially—filled with foreign bodies or foreign processes, and so on. Or, if a person develops the higher levels of their organization—which I have referred to as the astral body and the “I”-organization—to an excessive degree, then they are not only able to transform the external processes entering them from the environment as they should be transformed, but can transform them more intensely, more powerfully, and to an excessive degree. This results in an acceleration of the processes penetrating them. External nature is taken beyond the human realm; it is, so to speak—to put it in layman’s terms—over-spiritualized, and we are once again dealing with a disturbance of health. But what is here merely hinted at as a very abstract principle is, in fact, present in every organ of the human being; this must be studied specifically for each individual organ. And the human being truly behaves in a very complicated way with regard to the manner in which he processes external influences.

[ 8 ] Anyone who, going beyond the knowledge gained through today’s anatomy and physiology—which are certainly beyond dispute—seeks to further their education so as to transform what is gained through the study of cadavers or the study of medical cases—that is, the conceptual understanding of the human organism—into a way of observing it, not as some kind of dead structure, but as a living being with its own rhythms and processes—such a person actually stands quite helpless before the human organism at every moment; for the more precisely and vividly one comes to know the human organism, the more complicated it appears. There are, however, guidelines by which one can, as it were, fight one’s way through the labyrinth. And if I may insert a personal remark here, let it be this one; it is, at the same time, entirely objective.

[ 9 ] Finding such guidelines for understanding human organization in its entirety, in its totality, was actually a concern of mine for thirty years before I ever spoke publicly about it—which happened around 1917. As a relatively young person, in my early twenties, I asked myself: Is there a way to penetrate this complex human organization with certain guiding principles, so that one can gain some kind of overview? And it turned out—as I said, what I am now briefly elaborating on was a project I worked on for thirty years—that one can assess the entire human organism according to three aspects, distinguishing between: the nervous-sensory organization, the rhythmic organization, and the metabolic-limb organization. More than anything else, everything in the human organism that can be called the nervous-sensory organization belongs together. And this, in turn, is the vehicle for everything that can be described as the life of the imagination. But what can be called the rhythmic organization in human nature also proves to be, in a certain sense, self-contained: the rhythm of breathing, the rhythm of blood circulation, the rhythm manifested in sleeping and waking, and numerous other processes that proceed rhythmically within the human being. It was precisely through a proper, precise distinction between the rhythmic organization and the nervous-sensory organization that I first came to undertake this classification within the human being. At that time, nearly forty years ago—when fundamental physiological questions weighed more heavily on people’s minds than they do today—I had to ask myself the following question: Is it really possible, based on the phenomena that present themselves in experience, to say that the entire life of the soul—thinking, feeling, and willing—is bound to the nervous and sensory systems? This led me to an insurmountable contradiction: are thinking, feeling, and willing supposed to be bound to the nervous-sensory system? Of course, I cannot go into detail on this today; I can only point to the broader picture. Yet precisely when we enter the therapeutic realm, many things will become clearer to us. For example, if one truly studies the effects of music on the human organism from a physiological perspective and with precision; if one comes to understand the close connection between the experience of music and everything rhythmic in the human being, and if, on the other hand, one grasps the soulful aspect of music and studies the emotional element in the perception of melody and harmony with an open mind, then one first says to oneself: The whole emotional life of the human being is not directly linked to the nervous system, but is experienced in the rhythmic system; and only when we raise to the level of a mental image what we initially experience in music directly in the rhythmic system—and what, by being experienced there, becomes the world of emotion—is the mental image then supported by the nervous system. This leads one to the realization that the nervous system and the rhythmic system are indeed internally and structurally distinct from one another.

[ 10 ] Embrace contemporary physiology with all it has to offer; above all, embrace everything it can offer you in terms of external experiences you can have with music, and study something like the human ear as it perceives sounds—study this ear as it grasps musically structured sounds—and then you will find yourself saying: What is audible—that is, what is perceptible to the senses—is first incorporated into the human rhythmic system, rises rhythmically into the sensory organization, approaches the nervous system rhythmically, and is then presented by the nervous system. Our rhythmic system is directly connected to our emotional life, whereas the nervous system—which is the vehicle of thought—is connected only indirectly; it is the vehicle of feeling, however, only insofar as we become aware of our feelings through thoughts, and these thoughts are then carried by the nervous system.

[ 11 ] Similarly, one can make further progress by taking the physiological aspect to its logical conclusion—that is, the metabolic-limb system. It might seem paradoxical that I am combining these two things—metabolism and the limbs—but you need only consider how everything motoric, everything that is in motion and connected to the limbs, affects metabolism. The metabolic-limb system is already a unified whole. And if one examines these things not in a confused but in a precise manner, it becomes evident once again that the metabolic-limb system is the direct vehicle of all manifestations of the will in human beings. Again, it is the case that when what takes place in the metabolic-limb system—as the carrier of volitional manifestations—rises up, surges up into the rhythmic system—we have already established the direct connection between the metabolic system and the rhythmic system in the human organism—then it passes into feeling. We develop our feelings within our will as our will expresses itself directly in metabolic processes, directly. We experience the will indirectly through feeling in the rhythmic system. And we reflect on what we want as the metabolic system and the rhythmic system radiate their force into the nervous-sensory system.

[ 12 ] Here we are looking at a structure of the human being that truly provides guidelines for understanding the human organism. For if one examines what is present in the nervous-sensory system and compares it with what is present in the metabolic-limb system—leaving the rhythmic system aside for now—one finds a complete polar opposition in every direction: The nervous-sensory system and the metabolic-limb system are polar opposites; where the metabolic-limb system builds up, the nervous-sensory system breaks down, and vice versa. This and much else proves to be a polar opposition. Only when one understands the human organism in this way and then sees how everything that constitutes the “I” organization is, in the narrower sense, bound to the nervous-sensory system; how everything that constitutes the etheric body of the human organism is, in the narrower sense, bound to the metabolic-limb system; how everything that constitutes the astral body is bound to the rhythmic system; and how the physical body permeates the whole but is continually overcome by the three other members of the human organism—only then does one learn to look into what is normal or abnormal, into the so-called normal or abnormal processes of the human organism.

[ 13 ] Let us examine this in some detail so that we can discuss it in depth. Let us take the nervous-sensory system as an example. To avoid any misunderstanding, I would like to add a few remarks here. A very malicious naturalist, having heard only a very superficial account of this classification that I applied to human nature, claimed that I had attempted to distinguish between the head organization, the chest organization, and the lower abdomen organization: that is to say, I had, so to speak, concentrated the nervous-sensory system in the head, the rhythmic system in the chest, and the metabolic-limb system in the lower abdomen. But this is, of course, a thoroughly malicious interpretation. For if one does not make spatial distinctions, then in the human organism the nervous-sensory system is primarily organized in the head, but it is also to be found in the other two systems. The rhythmic organization is primarily localized in the human being’s central organization, but it is, in turn, spread throughout the entire human being. And likewise, the metabolic organization can be found everywhere in the human being. This is not a matter of distinguishing between organs that are spatially separate from one another, but rather something that must be grasped qualitatively—something that lives within and permeates the individual organs. - If, based on this view, one studies the nervous-sensory organization, one finds it spread throughout the entire organism. It is just that, for example, the eye or the ear is organized in such a way that it contains the nervous-sensory organization most intensely, the rhythmic organization to a lesser extent, and the metabolic organization to an even lesser extent. An organ such as the kidney, for example, does not contain as much of the nervous-sensory organization as the eye or the ear, but it does contain nervous-sensory organization; it contains more of the rhythmic organization and more of the metabolic organization, yet it contains all three components of the human organism within itself. And one cannot understand the human being if one describes him by saying: here are the senses, there are the digestive organs. That is not how it is. In reality, things are quite different. A sensory organ is only primarily a sensory organ; every sensory organ is also, in a certain sense, a digestive organ and a rhythmic organ. An organ such as the kidney or the liver is only, in the most fundamental sense, a nutritional or excretory organ; in a secondary sense, it is also a sensory organ. Therefore, when we look at the nervous-sensory organization—in terms of its reality, not according to the fanciful concepts that physiology so often constructs—and consider the entire human organism with its individual, specific organs, we find that human beings perceive the external world through the individual senses—sight, smell, hearing, and so on; but we see how the human being is completely permeated by sensory organization. The kidney, for example, is a sensory organ that subtly perceives what takes place in the processes of digestion and excretion. Similarly, the liver is, in a certain sense, a sensory organ; the heart is even, to a high degree, an internal sensory organ, and one can only understand it when viewed in this way.

[ 14 ] Please do not think that I wish in any way to be a critic of contemporary science; I fully acknowledge this science with all its merits and would like our perspective, in particular, to be based entirely on it. But one must realize that this science today is by no means yet capable of looking precisely into human nature. If it could do so, it would not, in the way it does today, bring the animal organism so close to the human one; for the animal organism, particularly with regard to sensory life, lies one level lower than the human organism. The human nervous-sensory organism is integrated into the “I” organism; the animal one is integrated only into the astral body. Human sensory life is entirely different from that of animals. When an animal perceives something through its eye—as you can see from a closer study of the eye’s structure—a process takes place within the animal that, so to speak, permeates its entire body; this does not occur in the same way as it does in humans. In humans, sensory perception remains much more peripheral, concentrated much more on the surface. You can infer this from the fact that in animals there are fine structures that, in higher animals, are usually present only in the etheric body. In certain lower animals, however, you find—for example—the sword-like process, which higher animals also possess in the etheric, or you find the fan-like structure in the eye. These are organs which, in the way they are permeated by blood, show that the eye participates in the animal’s overall organization and mediates a life within the sphere of the environment. In humans, on the other hand, we see how they are connected quite differently through their nervous-sensory organization and therefore also live in the external world in a much higher sense than animals do through theirs, whereas animals live more within themselves. But everything that, mediated in this way by the higher spiritual members of the human being, expresses itself through the “I” organization as nervous-sensory life—since it exists within the realm of the physical body—requires its influences, including its material influences, from the sensory world, from the physical world.

[ 15 ] If one closely studies the human nervous and sensory system when it is functioning in a completely healthy state within a person, one finds that it depends on a substance and the processes taking place within that substance. For a substance is never merely something at rest, but merely represents what is actually a process. A quartz crystal, for example, is only a limited, well-defined entity because we never perceive it as a process—a process that, although it proceeds very slowly, is nonetheless a process. One must delve ever deeper into the human organism to understand the interplay. Whatever enters the organism as an external physical entity must be taken up by the organism and overcome within it in the manner I described in the introduction. What is particularly interesting here is that the human nervous-sensory system, when it is in the so-called normal—that is, healthy—state—which, of course, must be understood as relative—depends on a subtle process that takes place under the influence of the silicic acid penetrating the organism. Silicic acid, which in the physical world takes the form of the beautiful quartz crystal, exhibits the peculiarity that, when it penetrates the human organism and is overcome by it, it is absorbed by the processes of the nervous-sensory system; so that if one can perceive spiritually what is taking place in the human nervous-sensory system, one sees a wonderfully subtle process at work within the silicic acid substance. But if, on the other hand, you consider what I said earlier—that the human being is sense everywhere—then you will realize that only within the human being’s immediate sphere—where the senses are primarily concentrated—does an intense silicic acid process take place; but that, as one moves deeper into the organism—where the lungs, liver, and kidneys are located—that silicic acid process becomes less pronounced, growing weaker again, while it then becomes strong once more in the bones. In this way, one obtains a remarkable structure of the human being. One has, so to speak, the periphery and the outer region, where the senses are concentrated; one has what fills and supports the limbs, the skeletal system; in between, one has the muscular system, the glandular system, and so on. In what I have described as the periphery and the center, the silicic acid process is strongest; and in the organs lying in between, one observes specific silicic acid processes that are unique to each organ but weaker than those in the periphery. One might say: outwardly, where the human being transitions from the nervous system into the sensory system, more and more silicic acid is needed; in the center of the organism, relatively little silicic acid is needed; but where the skeletal system underlies the motor system, more silicic acid is needed again.

[ 16 ] By examining the entire human organism, we have thus also come to understand how a particularly specific process takes place within the human being: a silicic acid process in the human being. Once one becomes familiar with this, one also realizes just how imprecise today’s physiological data are. For if we today—and I emphasize once again: I do not wish to criticize here, I merely wish to provide information—study human life in terms of current physiology, we are directed, for example, toward the respiratory process. It is complicated in a certain sense, but essentially it consists of the human being taking in oxygen from the air and releasing carbon dioxide through exhalation. This is the rhythmic process that actually forms the basis of human organic life. We can describe it as follows: oxygen is taken in from the air through inhalation, passes through the processes described in physiology into the entire organism, combines with the carbon in the human blood, and is then excreted again as carbon dioxide through exhalation. This description is correct from a purely external point of view. But this process, which takes place with oxygen and carbon, is connected to another. For we do not merely inhale oxygen and combine it with the carbon in our organism. We do this primarily with the oxygen that we distribute downward throughout our organism; we combine that oxygen primarily with the carbon and then exhale it again as carbon dioxide. But underlying this rhythmic process is yet another, more subtle process. Namely, the oxygen that moves toward the head in the human organism—and thus, in the limited sense indicated earlier, toward the nervous-sensory system—combines with silicon, that is, with the substance we call silica, and forms silicic acid. And while the production of carbon dioxide is essential for the metabolic system, the production of silicic acid in humans is essential for the nervous-sensory system. However, this is a subtle process that we cannot yet observe with our crude instruments; but all the pathways are in place to enable us to observe it one day. Thus, in respiration, we have a coarser process in which the inhaled oxygen combines with the carbon in our organism and is exhaled as carbon dioxide. Alongside this, we have a more subtle process in which oxygen combines with silicon to form silicic acid, which is secreted into the human organism as such. And through this secretion of silicic acid, the entire human organism—to a greater extent at the periphery, to a lesser extent in every organ—becomes a sensory organ.

[ 17 ] If one views the human organism in this way, one looks into its delicate structure; one observes how each individual organ—and just as it behaves with regard to silicic acid, so it behaves with regard to countless other substances—has, and must have, its specific set of processes bound to substances. If one wishes to understand health or illness, one must now grasp how these processes unfold within a human organ. Let us take the human kidney as an example. If circumstances lead one to do so—if a complex of symptoms suggests that a disease process has its primary source in the kidney—one will be compelled to make that diagnosis. By applying Spiritual Science to the diagnostic process, we come to the conclusion that the kidney functions too little as a sensory organ for the surrounding digestive and excretory processes; it functions too much as a metabolic organ, and thus the balance is disturbed. In such a case, we must first and foremost consider: How can we restore the kidney’s function as a sensory organ to a greater degree? — We can say: Because the kidney shows that it is not sufficiently a sensory organ for the digestive processes and excretions, we must ensure that the necessary silicic acid reaches the kidney. From an anthroposophical perspective, we now have three ways to supply the human organism with the substances it needs to maintain a healthy state. The first way is to administer them internally, like food, per os, as a remedy. In this case, however, we must wait to see whether the entire digestive system is organized in such a way that it transports the substances precisely to where they are supposed to take effect. This is certainly the case with many substances, and one must know how a substance acts in the human organism—whether it affects the heart or the lungs, and so on—when we introduce it into the digestive system through the mouth. The second method is by injection. Here, we introduce a substance directly into the rhythmic system. In this case, the process itself is more effective; the substance’s material composition is immediately transformed into rhythmic activity, and we then act directly on the rhythmic system. Or, as a third approach, we prepare the substance as an ointment and apply it to the appropriate part of the body, or we use it as a bath; in short, we seek to exert an effect by applying it more externally to the human organism. There are, of course, many other methods as well. In this way, then, we have three methods for administering the substances to the human being.

[ 18 ] Let us now consider the kidney, which, in the course of diagnosis, presents itself to us as having a diminished sensory capacity. In this case, we must then introduce the proper silicic acid process into it, We must ensure one thing: because in the previously mentioned respiratory process—where oxygen combines with silica and the silicic acid then spreads throughout the body—too little silicic acid is directed toward the kidney; therefore, we must ensure that a stronger silicic acid process is directed toward the kidney. To do this, we must know how to assist the organism, which cannot produce enough silicic acid for the kidneys on its own. We must identify what, externally, corresponds to the process that the kidneys lack. Now, somewhere in nature we find something that contains precisely the process that is missing somewhere in the organism. We must seek to discover: How can we find ways and means to introduce the silicic acid process specifically into the kidney?

[ 19 ] There we find that kidney function—particularly insofar as it is also a sensory function—depends on the human astral body. The astral body underlies, in particular, the excretory processes—this specific form of metabolic breakdown. Therefore, we must stimulate the astral body, but in such a way that it delivers silicic acid—which we supply from an external source—directly to an organ such as the kidney. We therefore need a remedy that, first, stimulates the silicic acid process, and second, stimulates it specifically in the kidney. If we search, we come across Equisetum arvense—the common field horsetail—within the plant kingdom. It has the distinctive property of containing a high concentration of silicic acid. If we were to administer pure silicic acid to a person, it would not reach the kidneys. Equisetum also contains sulfuric acid salts. When we use sulfuric acid salts on their own, they act on the rhythmic system, on the excretory organs, and on the kidneys in particular. And when they are so intimately bound to the silicic acid, as is the case with Equisetum arvense—we can administer it internally, but if that proves impossible, we can use the other methods described—then these sulfuric acid salts in Equisetum pave the way for the silicic acid to reach the kidneys.

[ 20 ] Now, based on a single case, we have recognized what is pathological about kidney disease. We have proceeded with great precision; we have sought out what compensates for the defective process in the kidney; we are building a bridge—one that is clear and understandable step by step—from pathology to therapy.

[ 21 ] Let’s consider another case: We are dealing with some kind of disorder in the digestive system—disorders that are generally grouped under the term “dyspepsia” or something similar. By again proceeding in the manner of Spiritual Science as described, one will be able to see that this is primarily a matter of a defective “I” organization that is not functioning strongly enough. Why is this “I” organization not functioning strongly enough? That is the question now. And we must look somewhere within the functioning of the human organism to find the underlying cause of why the “I” organization is not functioning strongly enough. In certain cases, we will find that there is insufficient bile secretion. In such a case, we must assist the “I” organization by doing—just as we did previously with Equisetum in relation to kidney function—ensuring that, in relation to bile secretion, we also provide the organism with something that, when it reaches its proper place due to its composition, helps an “I” organization that is functioning too weakly. Just as we find that the silicic acid process, when introduced into the kidney in the proper way—as the process underlying the normally functioning nervous-sensory system—enhances its sensory capacity, so we find that processes such as bile secretion, which correspond primarily to the “I” organization, are now connected to a very specific way in which—in relation to other elements—carbon acts within the organism. Here, for example, a curious fact emerges: When we seek to introduce carbon into the organism in the correct manner specifically to counteract dyspepsia, we find that carbon—which is, of course, naturally present in every plant—is contained in Cichorium intybus in such a way that it is directed toward the organ responsible for bile function. If we know how to extract the correct preparation from Cichorium intybus, we can direct a certain carbon process toward the gallbladder function in the same way that we introduce a silicic acid process into the kidney with the Equisetum preparation.

[ 22 ] Using simple, easy-to-understand examples—which may point to mild or, in some cases, very severe illnesses—I have attempted to illustrate the principle of how, through a spiritual-science understanding of the human organism on the one hand, and of the various creatures of nature and their interrelationships on the other, the following can be achieved: First, an understanding of the disease process; second, an understanding of what is necessary to reverse a disease process that is proceeding in a certain direction. Healing thereby becomes a transparent art. This is what the art of pharmacy, the art of healing, and medicine can gain from that form of scientific research which is called anthroposophy here. This is by no means a flight of fancy. It is, in fact, what—as I mentioned recently—drives research to the utmost precision, enabling us above all to gain a comprehensive understanding of the whole human being, to comprehend him from the physical, soul, and spiritual perspectives. And in human beings, the healthy and diseased states depend on the interplay of the physical, the psychological, and the spiritual. By dividing the human being into the nervous-sensory system, the rhythmic system, and the metabolic-limb system, one also gains insight into the various processes and their degrees. One learns to recognize how a sensory function is present in the kidney once one becomes attentive to the essence of the sensory function; otherwise, one seeks the sensory function only in its coarser forms in the ordinary senses. But then one comes to understand diseases as such.

[ 23 ] I have already said that in the metabolic-limb system, processes occur that are opposite to those taking place in the nervous-sensory system. But it may be that processes which, in their most essential nature, are nervous-sensory processes—and which, for example, take place in the cranial nerves, where they are therefore normal—can, so to speak, be displaced to the metabolic-limb system; that something may then occur in the metabolic-limb system—due to an abnormality of the astral body and the “I” organization—that would otherwise be correct and normal within the nervous-sensory system. This means that what is correct for one system can be transformed into something pathogenic for another system. Consequently, when a process that belongs, for example, to the nervous-sensory system appears in another system, a pathological process arises. This is the case with typhus. Typhoid fever represents a process that belongs to the nervous system. While it should be taking place there within the physical organization, it actually occurs in the region of the metabolic system within the etheric organization—the etheric body—transfers itself to the physical body, and manifests as typhoid fever. Here one gains insight into the nature of disease. Or it can also happen that the dynamics—the forces—that are active in a sense organ, and which must be active there to a certain degree for the sense organ to come into being as such, become active in the wrong place. What acts within a sense organ can, in some transformed way, also become active in another location. Let us take the activity of the ear: Instead of manifesting itself in the nervous-sensory system—due to circumstances that can also be described—it manifests itself in another location, for example, somewhere in the metabolic system, where it connects with the rhythmic system. Then, in the wrong place, an abnormal tendency toward a sensory organ arises. And this manifests as a carcinoma, as a cancerous growth. Only when you are able to understand the human organism in this way can you recognize that, in a carcinoma, you have, so to speak, a sensory formation tendency that has become dislocated across the systems.

[ 24 ] When we speak of anthroposophy enriching medicine, we are referring to the process of learning to see how abnormalities in the human organism arise when something that is normal in one particular system is transferred into another system. But it is only by gaining this insight into the human organism that one is truly able to understand it in both its healthy and diseased states—and thereby bridge the gap from pathology to therapy, from observing the patient to healing. When these ideas are presented in context, it will become clear that what can be said from such a perspective is by no means at odds with modern medicine. As a first step in this direction—and I believe quite soon—the book co-authored by Dr. Wegman, the director of the Clinical-Therapeutic Institute in Arlesheim, and myself will be published; it is intended to present, in a coherent manner, what can be said from such a perspective of Spiritual Science—not in contradiction to, but as a complement to, modern medicine. People will then be able to see for themselves that this is not some kind of nonsense, as is so common today; rather, that book will demonstrate—in a manner that does full justice to modern science—the enrichment that Spiritual Science research can bring to the art of healing. Precisely as one examines these matters in ever greater detail and with scientific rigor, one will also recognize the efforts being made at an institution such as the International Laboratories in Arlesheim, where a whole range of new remedies is being produced according to the principles outlined here.

[ 25 ] In the third lecture, my task will be to further substantiate what has already been hinted at regarding rational therapy by examining very specific individual cases of illness and their possible cures—to the extent that this can be explained here in layman’s terms. Anyone who can see through what is at stake here will truly have no fear or concern about a thorough examination of what is suggested here. We know that this matter will be just like the field of anthroposophy as a whole: those who do not get to know it in detail will initially be the ones to rail against it, rebuke it, and criticize it. Those who come to know the details will then cease their criticism. That is why, in my next lecture, I will present some further details intended to show that we do not wish to proceed in the field of anthroposophical medicine by circumventing modern science, but rather in full harmony with it—while striving to supplement this science through spiritual insight. Only then, when this is understood, will the art of healing stand on its proper foundation. For the art of healing has to do with the human being. The human being is a being composed of body, soul, and spirit. True medicine can therefore only exist if it also penetrates to an understanding of the human being in terms of body, soul, and spirit.