90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: The Salvation of Humanity
15 May 1904, Berlin |
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90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: The Salvation of Humanity
15 May 1904, Berlin |
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Will not all of humanity be saved? - Yes, if they want to. Abyss stage after the seven races have expired, but because of the earth metamorphosis itself, there will still be a chance to catch up. Then comes Jupiter, the Jupiter stage will show a stark difference between good and evil people, but even there, in the second half, there will be the possibility to catch up again. And only in the sixth metamorphosis, Venus, will the decision be made. Then those who are bound to matter will fall into a hardened planetary state. But these are only the black magicians, those who use illicit magical means in the service of selfishness. Even today, the ordinary citizen cannot imagine the wickedness of these people. Through black magic, man is able to found his own realm alongside the realm of development. There are already those who have decided to form this secondary planet, and there are attempts to do so, which the ordinary person cannot even imagine, to go this way apart from development. Today, no one who comes into question has the opportunity not to find a way to salvation, because it is not yet known how to start becoming a black magician, that is, founding one's own realm. For certain reasons, because the power of the opponent often proves to be stronger than the positive power, we have the scorpion instead of the eagle in the zodiac. Throne, cherubs, seraphim and so on are the spiritual hierarchies that stand behind the zodiacal figures. Man has retained the internal rhythm in many things, but he has shifted it in relation to the external rhythm. He frees himself from the external natural rhythm within his individual development, and it is a sin against progress to want to reduce man by so-called imitation of nature. Regarding the question about the Mazdasnan sect. |
90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: On the Apocalypse I
21 May 1904, Berlin |
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90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: On the Apocalypse I
21 May 1904, Berlin |
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Yesterday we arrived at the point where the earth passed over into spiritualization; mature people go along with it and return with it to the sun. The forces of matter have been eliminated, are no longer present. This development initially leads to an ever-increasing spiritualization; only then does the human being rise with his planet into the astral, then into the devachanic state. The sun spiritualizes with the earth. The beings who have not cared for such spiritualization do not take part in this. Initially, no lump can remain, everything astralizes, but the immature form a kind of sputum in this stage of development. There is such an astral, which is pure, noble, higher than the physical. But another astral, in which are those beings who are more malignant and lower than those of physical development.
- astral world, which is below the physical. In this world, the beings that are in it are not in a physical body like a human being, but they have a terrible power of evil. All the powers that oppose our development dwell in it. The spirit of Mammon dwells in it, the spirit of obstacles, which puts the brakes on wherever there is a desire for progress. It is already active today. When the earth itself enters an astral state, then all those beings who could not go into the higher astral world must go down into this lower one. Thus, after the trumpets, we have a world that has been cast out, and this is a world of darkness. In the astral body, all beings are present that were unable to attain the degree of maturity to enter the sun. Before the Lemurian development, man descended into the physical body. At that time, peculiar spiritual beings were connected to the earth. Each of the planetary stages has seen a stage of humanity develop: on the moon, sun, Saturn... There are beings that could not complete their development in a particular planetary state. This also happened on the moon. These beings were transferred to the earth. The world progresses beyond a certain level, but certain beings remain behind. The angels who had not matured stood between human beings and angels; the hosts of Lucifer. They were the ones who pulled people back in their development, who caused a deeper entanglement in matter. Thus, the Luciferic development is linked to the human being. It has its good and bad sides. The good consists in the fact that without the luciferic influence man could not have become a free being. He has made himself independent of the direct guidance of higher beings. But this has made possible the fall into evil. Thus, for the salvation of man, the luciferic beings have also made a sacrifice by holding back their development. Now it is different. The conditions are quite different before the middle of a development and afterwards. So it is not materialistic people who are making a sacrifice now, but on the contrary, progressive people. - Do not schematize. What is the positive thing that the luciferic beings have done? On Saturn, man had only a physical body.
The physical is the oldest link that has undergone the most transformations. Marvelous construction of the heart, brain, etc. Sun, Moon on Earth, I-aura. If the Luciferic beings had not been present in Lemurian times, when the 'I' began to develop, the higher beings would have remained with man. And Yahweh. The Luciferic beings could not participate in the development of the 'I', only in the astral body. So the effect of the Luciferic beings came into that. They gave the astral body independence, but also the possibility of falling into evil. In this way, the beings of Lucifer undergo a certain development. They make up in the astral body of man what they missed on the moon and achieve what they should have achieved there. They can vicariously experience in man what they missed on the moon. They advance with us. When the Earth unites with the Sun, there will be such Luciferic beings who will unite with the Sun with it. And so, by working on the sublimation of his instincts, man can redeem Lucifer. But only to the extent that he allows himself to be redeemed. There will be those who resist, who during their time on Earth remain in the state in which they were when they came to Earth. They will be cast out and appear as the evil astral world. There emerges the group of Luciferian entities that did not want to come any further. The old serpent is cast out, and the first of the dragons emerges. When the earth enters the sun, it is what is left behind. But there are still other returnees: the people who do not move forward. There are those who cannot help it, who do not come to the state of awakening that is necessary for spirituality. They remain slaves to their animal instincts. Even if they cannot help it, they are still an evil force. This is the second of the animals, those who remain stuck in animality, cast out as the second of the animals. The “old serpent” says the Apocalypse – the luciferic beings – appear from heaven; the second dragon rises from the sea, that is what has remained in the lower nature in the development of the earth itself, “the animal in its totality – remaining in its instincts. Now for the third type of being that lags behind. These are those who acquire the potential for black magic on earth. They lag behind within humanity, develop abilities that lead to the supersensible nature, but they use this ability in the service of black magic. Not in their instincts, but in full consciousness, they have turned away and yield to carnal matter for the sake of Sorat. He incarnates in them as their group soul. These people will be the incarnation of the Sun Demon. When will they emerge? Let us imagine the further course of the earth's development. Union with the Sun. Because not everything has matured, man must return to the physical plane once more. Once again, the solar element separates. This also offers a chance of salvation for those who have been left behind by instinct. The mature decide in the moment of highest union to form another world body next to the sun, and to take in the beings that have been left behind, in order to be taken back again by the sun in the next cycle. This present cycle means what? Every world body must undergo repetitions of what it has already undergone. Before the earth was able to begin as the earth, it had to repeat [gap in the transcript] After the earth has united with the sun, it must prophetically anticipate future planetary developments. A pre-advent of the Jupiter, Venus, Vulcan state. During the pre-advent of the Jupiter state, the beings come out and the Jupiter Earth is there next to the Sun. On the Jupiter Earth, the beings have the opportunity to be taken back; the lower states are only there in hints and on the Vulcan state everything merges into one another. So, after our Earth, we experience a Jupiter Earth. There even the black magicians – Sorat – have the opportunity to return to the sun. But a number of them will not do so. And now that they have remained on the Jupiter Earth, a number of people, the Earth spiritualizes again. Once more, those who have spiritualized decide to return and form an intermediate Earth. Some Sorat-beings allow themselves to be redeemed once again; others still stubbornly resist on Venus Earth; and for them there is no longer any possibility of redemption on Vulcan Earth. The sixth, the Venus intermediate state, is therefore the decisive one. It is only in the sixth state of the Venus Earth planet that this decisive step comes. In this, there is again something that parallels the sub-races, so development waits for the smallest cycle, that is, for the sixth sub-state there, in order to still save. And only there, in the sixth sub-state of the sixth main state of the Venus cycle, is everything over: 666. Those who give their corporeality to incarnate the sun demon as their group soul have finally decided to put their powers at the service of evil. The first dragon is therefore not a human being – Lucifer. Nor is the second – animal. But in the most eminent sense, they are people who have surrendered to the Sorat. 666 is therefore not an animal sign, but a human one. “Here is wisdom." The apocalypticist therefore probably knew what we know as the development of the earth through 7x7x7 states. This apocalypse is truly an outline of the whole development. Let us consider the Venus Earth. It is a colorful place. On the Jupiter Earth, many can still be saved. For the Venus Earth, the worst human material remains. But there is not much hope there either. Those who spiritualize have only limited power to save. The forces are not sufficient to save. The worst have to wait for the future Jupiter and the future Venus, where the spiritual people have stronger powers. So the most wicked prevail on this Venus Earth. Indeed, much must be expelled; vice must be overcome, for which there is no power to redeem it. This presents itself to the apocalyptic as a plunge into the abyss of evil Babylon. The woman - the spirit of Venus-Earth - is completely filled with evil vices. Thus the fall of Venus-Earth is foreshadowed in the fall of Babylon. Those people who have tried to save what can still be saved continue to develop; what has reached maturity rises to a final state of the earth, to the volcano earth. There everything is cleansed and purified. In what field is man creative today? He is able to put the lifeless forces of nature at his service by painting a canvas or carving marble. But he cannot make marble come alive. He does not rule over the living, he masters inanimate nature. In the white-magical sense, he will only be able to control plant forces on the future Jupiter. What will become of the cathedrals, the domes, the Raphael Madonnas? Their physical materiality will disintegrate - Leonardo's Last Supper. But they will not disappear. Analogous to this are today's crystals, which are formed out of the mountains. The saying of the Egyptian sages: [gap in the transcript] Just as we build and create works of art today, in the past forms were gradually worked out in the cosmos. This now grows out of the earth as a natural being. When the Earth has reached its goal, the works of art will grow out of it like natural products out of the renewing Earth. The Madonna on the canvas will fade away, but today's human labor will give the dwelling place into which later humanity will be born. The apocalyptic calls this dwelling place the “New Jerusalem.” There human labor will be resurrected. The human labor invested in it will be the seeds for the New Jerusalem. Thus the new earth will come into being, and it will be possible for people to live there who fit into this new state and who have kept pace with the development. These people will be able to say to themselves: This is the place for us, who will have developed love out of wisdom so that peace can be. “Jeru Salem” means “the place of peace.” |
90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: On the Apocalypse II
24 May 1905, Berlin |
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90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: On the Apocalypse II
24 May 1905, Berlin |
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There were a few directives that I could give to better understand this momentous work. Today, we want to deal with a single issue of human development, because it will shed light on the whole development. There are seven periods in post-Atlantean culture, and we are currently in the fifth. Each period has a specific task in relation to the human being. The human being is reborn because the conditions on Earth have changed. The great developmental epochs really work on the human being. Let us bear in mind that the human being consists of a physical body, an etheric body, an astral body and an I. When the human being began his development on Earth, he had developed the first three bodies. The task on Earth is to develop the I. Let us look back at Atlantis, at the last third. In the last third, man had received the first seed to say “I” to himself. That was only a first seed. The two previous post-Atlantean thirds had to draw this “I” to themselves bit by bit. The main moment for the development of the “I” is the event of Golgotha. What is the fact that man received his “I” in the last third of Atlantis? Before man had arrived at this germ of the I, the connection between the physical body and the etheric body was quite different than later. Today, the etheric body of the head has approximately the same size and shape, which was not the case in Atlantis, where the etheric body still protruded. A certain point of the etheric head had to enter in order to connect with a point in the forebrain. Through this “mating”, the human being became mature enough to gradually develop his ego. To educate this ego, the human being needed the processing of the entire physical body, and all the rest of the Atlantean development was used to make the human physical body a carrier of the ego. It was only after the Atlantic catastrophe that the human brain was so dense that it could become an ego carrier. The hydrocephalus is an atavism from ancient times. A firm, compact head was made by the etheric head going inside. And so the Indian culture could arise, in which a similar brain was already present. But the etheric body inside the physical body had not yet been educated to become a complete I-bearer. That is why the Indian longed to get out of this world. Thus, in post-Atlantic culture, people begin to make changes to their etheric body that make it possible for the body to develop into an I-bearer. The I works from the inside out to transform the other bodies. Because the work of reworking the physical body begins with regulating the breath, the spiritual person is called “Atm”. Thus we can speak of seven basic parts. If we want to go into more detail in the sense and spirit of post-Atlantean culture, then we have to base it on the division into nine limbs as in my “Theosophy”. In Nordic mysteries, the division into nine was always taught. In a sense, the future conscious work with the lower members must be anticipated. It must be preceded by unconscious work. This already took place in the Atlantean body – and also now. Only the initiated work quite consciously. First, therefore, there is an unconscious transformation of the astral body through the influence of higher powers of the ego. The result of this unconscious transformation of the astral body is now called the sentient soul. The transformed etheric body is the mind soul, and the transformed physical body is what we call the consciousness soul. But even under the guidance of higher spiritual beings, the human being then begins to work more consciously and to develop the spirit self. Physical body, etheric body, astral body, sentient soul, intellectual soul, consciousness soul, spirit self, life spirit, spiritual man – these are the nine members of the human being. These were the nine members taught in the old Nordic mysteries. What is formed between the astral body and the spirit self is developed step by step. In the first impulse, the I-radiation in the Atlantean time transformed it into the consciousness soul. This consciousness soul must educate the others in order to educate itself; then it must allow the Christ principle to permeate it in order to develop the spirit self. In Indian culture, the etheric body is permeated by the Christized I. In Persian culture, the sentient body In Philadelphia [the apocalypse], the first spark of the spirit self is struck under the influence of the Christ principle. We are therefore in the culture that develops the consciousness soul and have to prepare ourselves to receive the Christed spiritual self. In Philadelphia, Christ will appear again in a finer body that will be visible to those who have prepared themselves. In this way, the theosophical movement enables people to see Christ. This is how this processing of the bodies is gradually and thoroughly carried out. This is how we, through the wisdom of Theosophia, lead people to rise above themselves, to not get stuck in the personal, and thus become able to recognize Christ. Because it was necessary in terms of the evolution of the earth, Theosophy has entered our lives. In the sixth period, meteorical phenomena that have materialized are evoked, and the others begin to ascend higher. But the sub-periods in it, which are characterized by the horses - white clothes and so on - do not pass by human development without leaving a trace. The three bodies interpenetrate more intimately with the three souls and with what will be acquired as a spiritual self. So what has happened in the sixth period? The four members and the finer differentiations of the I will have been worked through to a completely different extent. The three souls will have grown into the three bodies, they will have grown into them intimately. What does it mean when we say that these members have grown together? They will have acquired the ability to create expression in the physical body. This ability is acquired through the fact that the person has worked through three periods of time. The fact that the person brings with them a development in the sixth period of time, in which they have worked on their soul, means that they have endeavored to spiritualize themselves. The third and the fourth will become intimately interwoven when they have completed the three cycles or epochs. This passage through a cycle, in which he has truly absorbed everything that a cycle offers, is called ©. Man is then finished with the completion of the cycle to its end. They have achieved the interpenetration of the three with the four. Sensitive soul / intellectual soul / consciousness soul. First the number seven. Then, for the next period, the characteristic number is twelve, the multiplier. The twelve-thousanders emerge after completing the three cycles. Three zeros next to the twelve: 12,000.
Now the various groups of people with 12 and 3 zeros who have joined the brotherhood of Philadelphia are designated. 144,000 are multiplied by the twelve groups (12x12) that have thus formed. Those who have developed the power over their soul will also have the power in the other souls. When soul works its way into soul, the deeds of men multiply. Thus, the apocalyptic shows us in depth that he knows the whole secret of human development. The truth is told in such a way that the human being is educated to penetrate from the cover into the real form, so that the consciousness soul is also developed. It is important to find certain things for oneself. That is why theosophy is presented later in a different form of wisdom. Even what is said today is still veiled. Those who were initiated at the time of the apocalypse have already received the meaning. But what is esoteric in one age later becomes exoteric. That is the meaning of development. The esoteric transforms into the exoteric in the course of human development. This is also the case with the secret of Golgotha. The last act in the initiation of the mysteries. Awakening from the lethargic death and crucifixion, entombment and resurrection of the one to be initiated. Then it emerged, became an external historical fact, the historically evolved mystery wisdom of ancient times. The conservative mind always resists what is esoteric being carried out into the world. Christ was regarded as one who brought the mysteries into public life. The inner will appear more and more in the outer, unfolding splendor and color. If they had been able to follow the apocalypticist, they would have heard exactly the same thing when he spoke to his intimate disciples. The sixth period has something of a decision everywhere. Philadelphia culture over into another time. The sixth seal brings the number twelve. The sixth trumpet also brings something crucial. 5 Jupiter Earth, 6 Venus Earth - overcoming the great Babylon. Saved all who can be saved. It is decided who has to wait until the next time. Repetition of Saturn 1, Sun 2, Moon 3, Earth 4, Jupiter 5, Venus 6, Vulcan 7. When the Earth is forming into a world body for the sixth time, having completed five rounds, the sixth state is there, but the seventh is not yet. Therefore, for the time when Babylon is overcome, we are told:
Five have fallen, that is Saturn, Sun... They are gone for the elect - only sputum as beast -, and the sixth is, and the seventh has not yet come. Up to this, the apocalypticist characterizes exactly. One more thing: we have seven states, these are the proper ones that are gone through to ascend. But those who have proven to be immature are also placed under Sorat. What happens to them? They now have to separate a world of their own, on which they continue their development. So a special sphere separates, it falls out. [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] A small colony of the wicked, the black magicians, settle there. Read in the theosophical literature about the mysterious eighth sphere, which goes left, while the other goes right. He will remain there for a time, and the beast is the eighth and has come from the seventh and leads to destruction. The apocalypticist also knows that in addition to the seven balls, there is also an eighth. All theosophy could be extracted. The more development progresses, the more strength is needed to lead those who have turned away from spiritualization back to it. Therefore, an attempt must be made to save what can still be saved through the best. That is why Moses and Elijah are called upon. And we see them saying Wisdom in a later epoch on Earth. Moses and Elijah are among those who are initiated very early on. Therefore, they have to work later. Karma is at work in the world. The highest and the lowest are subject to it. Those who are initiated before Golgotha must attain the karmic correspondence. What happened earlier? Lived in a lethargic state in the physical body for three and a half days. What was done? Nothing. Left to the outer powers. These three and a half years drop out of the development of these initiates. These are the only three and a half years that the old initiate has ignored in the work of his ego. Such a thing must also find its karmic balance. There, where they occur in their state of development, they must again leave their physical body to the outer world for three and a half days. Therefore we read:
And so we have the karmic fulfillment of leaving the body to external powers. Even deeds that are done as sacrifices must find their karmic compensation. Except for the names, we find in the Apocalypse what Christ is. Christ is the deepest impulse that enters into the I of man. The I takes the Christ. We can characterize the I through intimate contemplation. Everyone can call all external things by their name. The name of the I must resound from within. The Christ plunges into this principle of the human being and gradually permeates it. A name that is not written in the external world, that only the one with the name can fertilize, who has it - recognize.
That in the end the earth will be spiritualized in the sun, that everything will be spiritualized in the outer Jerusalem, is expressed:
First the apocalyptic seer sees the leader who guided our Earth as Vishnu Karma, then as Ahura Mazdao and so forth. He sees him as the one who carries the seven stars, who has the brazen rod, the spirits of development in his hand and the sword in his mouth. The word [gap in the transcript] Everything undergoes a certain transformation. Even the organs, for example the heart muscle; it is on the way to becoming an arbitrary muscle. The larynx is on the way to becoming a reproductive organ. Through the voice, human beings will produce their own kind. Today, human beings can only communicate that which inspires their soul by communicating with the air. But more and more of the human being is communicated in this way. And man will multiply out of himself through the voice. “In the primeval beginning” and at the end will be the Logos - creating word. And so the mighty vision of the sword from the mouth is at a higher level the reawakening of Atlantis. Vision: Lamb instead of four animals. Sorat pushed down by an archangel - Sorat. “In brief” is a wrong translation: the apocalypticist does not mean “in a short time”, but “in a brief outline”. Theosophy is the commentary on the Apocalypse - and in our time it is the only possible commentary. |
90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: On the Significance of the Oldest Parts of the Old Testament
28 May 1904, Berlin |
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90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: On the Significance of the Oldest Parts of the Old Testament
28 May 1904, Berlin |
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I wanted to say a few more words about the significance of the oldest parts of the Old Testament before moving on to other things. I have often told you that in interpreting the Old Testament, you come to a point where you can begin to take it more or less literally. Now, in the nineteenth century, we experienced an age that was as ill-suited as possible to comprehend something like the five books of Moses. Anyone who understands these five books of Moses will not only see an increase in their insight into the world, but also an increase in their inner appreciation and reverence for all the writings that speak to us, as something that is not only a human voice, but - let us leave this for the time being in an unspecified way - something that resonates down to us from higher spheres than the human spheres. In fact, we could and perhaps will be able to go back to the origin, to the actual theories of such writings, to the first inspirers. But we do not want to do that today. We want to touch on a question that goes back to an historical fact, which admittedly cannot be established by the external means of literature today, but which will become quite clear once the theosophical movement has taken root. So, I would like to consider an historical fact first. At the time when Christianity had its first starting point, when Jesus of Nazareth lived, there was the school of Philo in the famous Alexandria. Among the manifold teachings that Philo gave, the most outstanding were those that he gave his students about the five books of Moses. I note that one of these students was the evangelist who wrote the Gospel of John. So the spirit that lived in the Egyptian schools also lives in the Fourth Gospel. This interpretation required a very special spiritual quality, and Philo began by telling his students that the five books of Moses were not written to express what is told in them, but that this was only an outer garment to express deep inner human truths. Line by line, the Old Testament is to be understood as allegorical, symbolic of human inner processes, of such processes that also took place in time at the same time, that is, the processes took place in the hearts of the people for many hundreds of years, from the time when Abraham wandered in the Canaanite land until the time when the Jews were led into Babylonian captivity. There events took place that did not happen outwardly, but in the souls, which were, however, connected with historical events. But one does not understand the historical events if one does not bring them into connection with the inner happenings. Above all, the students entered into a mood in which the whole of the Old Testament appeared to them as a revelation of the inner human self. I will give you a few examples in a moment. What I have told you was regarded by nineteenth-century scholars as mere myth, especially the explanations given by Philo. He still gave these in a very forceful manner in oral discourse. Everything that has come down to posterity from this has been regarded as an allegorical interpretation, to which nothing more can be added. In the nineteenth century, the aim was to remain on the physical plane and to examine the facts that arise for the historian. Even if the Bible was doubted in its chronology, even if it was no longer believed that the world was created 4000 years before the birth of Christ, at the beginning of the nineteenth century the Bible was still taken as a kind of historical document, as something that gave us information about historical events. The events that were narrated - even if they were inaccurately narrated - were taken as if they mattered. I am now talking from the point of view of external scholarly research. The other things that occurred in the occult realm were not noticed at all. But something did result from the achievement of deciphering the cuneiform script. It turned out that what can be found in the stories of the Old Testament can also be found in the Babylonian legends and myths. In particular, they tell us of a creation of the world that is very similar to the biblical creation of the world. The story of the Fall of Man is also told in a very similar way in the Babylonian myth. The content of the significant seal impressions is significant. It is the impression that shows two people sitting under a tree with a snake. We have the Fall of Man depicted on a seal impression that is much older than the writings themselves. So in cuneiform writing we have the story of the Fall of Man, the salvation of humanity in a similar way to Noah and so on, so that it became clear that the view that the Old Testament was based on divine revelation, given directly to Moses by God, could no longer be maintained. It is self-evident that secular scholarship has concluded from this that the Jews did not receive these legends by revelation, but that they brought them down with them from their ancestral homeland at the time when they came down, and that they were then influenced from outside. The further you get into the Old Testament, the clearer it becomes. You have to assume that what we are told about Joseph, who lived around the time of the pharaohs and who helped the Jews achieve a respected position in Egypt, is true. And it must also be assumed that there was also such a Moses. At least you could feel that there would be a story together. In later times, historical records have again undermined the ground for purely historical research. We have documents that testify that in the time in which the story of Joseph took place, peoples whom we cannot describe otherwise than as Hebrews lived in the land of Canaan and that they turned to Pharaoh for support in a famine. These letters are written in the Babylonian language and addressed to the Egyptian pharaoh. From this it can be seen that the Babylonian language must have been highly regarded. The language of the educated at that time was the Babylonian language, as in earlier centuries with us it was the French language. But something else has emerged. The person of Joseph has become highly doubtful. History has gradually eroded this figure. It has been established that a personality who was governor in a Jewish land is identical to Joseph, so that the story in the Bible corresponds to a governor who could not have experienced the story. At the court of the Pharaoh, he advocated for the Jews' petitions to the Pharaoh. So we would not have a Joseph who spoke for his people in the way it is written in the Bible, but who, as governor, took care of the Jews, and that they also made the Egyptian journey back then. Today it seems more questionable than ever that the Israelites' journey to Egypt really took place. It is quite impossible that the retreat under Moses could have taken place as it is told. It is said that the Jews went into the desert, and it is said as if no other peoples were there. But at that time, this area must have been inhabited by other peoples who would have fiercely resisted. If we understand all this literally, then everything is in the air. Secular [historiography] has contributed to the dismemberment of the Bible. If the critic begins with his criticism, he sees himself standing before nothingness. The critic must end up saying, “I can't say anything.” It may be so, but it may also be otherwise – this is the conclusion that the secular critic must necessarily come to. In this regard, I can only provide a sketch. However, if you were to go through the matter and look at it, you would find – as I have indicated – that the result can only be what I have indicated: higher criticism and absolute lack of results. This probably has the effect that one will ask oneself: Are the interpretations that Philo of Alexandria gave, that it is just a play on words, correct, or are the old documents perhaps written in the sense that Philo of Alexandria could still know, but which was later forgotten? Not only in the first book of Moses, but also in the later books, an answer can be found if one examines it esoterically and if one asks oneself: Did it literally happen as it seems to be written there, or were the writers such who championed esotericism, were they spirits who, with what they outwardly presented, connected an inner meaning? The whole area that is involved and about which it is said that Abraham passed through it, that Abraham must have lived in it at the time that preceded a great invasion of the people, the area north of the Euphrates; Persia, India, but also Egypt, all these areas were full of occult schools. They were more or less left alone, especially until 2005 BC. But in the middle of the third millennium BC, great migrations of peoples took place. What is referred to as the Babylonian people also settled there around that time. In the past, there were even more peoples who knew what priestly rule meant. In all these areas there were seven degrees of initiation. The first degree was the degree of the “ravens”. Initiates of this degree were those who ensured the connection between the outside world and the secret places. Hence the ravens are the scouts who bring news of the outside world to those inside the temple, from which they can find the opportunity to work. When the old Barbarossa asks from century to century whether the ravens are still flying around the mountain, this is nothing more than the occult interpretation of whether the connection with the outside world still exists. In the second degree of initiation, those who could use the word were those who had learned so much that they were inspired by spiritual life. They were called the champions. In the third degree of initiation were those who could work through action, who stood firm through their power. They were called the “lions”. A warrior is one who works through the word; he is also called a prophet. But those who have become lions work through action. Sometimes, however, their work remains more or less unnoticed. They are often not recognized at all. Those initiated in the fourth degree were called the “occult” [those working inside the temple]. Those initiated in the fifth degree were called in each country according to the name of the [people] in question. In India they were called: “Man” - The initiates of the sixth degree were universally called the “sun-runners”. Their life had become so rhythmic that it ran as regularly as the course of the sun. He would have caused confusion if he had deviated from his path, just as the sun would cause confusion if it ever stepped out of its orbit. The sun-runners were the ones who were called upon to rule the nations. The kings of Western Asia, Southern Asia and Egypt were prepared for this by being initiated in the sixth degree. In the governors of Egypt, we therefore find sun-walkers who had reached a high degree of development, who understood the secret language of the world, and who also understood how to live out the spiritual secrets. It was said of such people that they led a life like the sun and that the sun, moon and stars bowed down before them, just as the moon and stars bow down before the sun. These solar walkers or solar heroes are told in the most diverse legends and myths. Hercules is nothing other than a solar hero. The twelve labors are the passage through the twelve signs of the zodiac. Jason is also such a solar walker who set out to bring the golden fleece from the rough land of the barbarians. Thus, you can find myths with solar heroes among different peoples. Scholars have often wondered why the heroes of the myths are so often depicted in similar ways. They have been surprised that the lives of Buddha, Hercules and Zarathustra, Osiris and Christ are so similar. If they had known that these were initiates of the sixth degree and that the life of a sun-runner was simply being told, then they would not have needed to wonder. Even the story of Christ is part of it, and it shows that these were real events in their lives, but that they were predetermined by their fellow brothers. Their course of life was mapped out thousands of years before. The life of a sun-runner was described before, because through thousands of years the life of such a hero has taken the same course. I would like to draw your attention to the story of Joseph. Read it and listen to my suggestions for how you might teach it. Joseph's father, Israel, made him a colorful coat. Among the Persians, those initiated at the fifth degree were called “Persians,” while among the Israelites they were called “Israeb.” It was a real event that those initiated at the fifth degree bowed to those initiated at the sixth degree on a certain day. Joseph told his brothers about his dream in which the sheaves bowed down to him, whereupon the brothers said to him: “Should you become our king and rule over us?” But they did not understand everything. Now he spoke even more clearly by telling his brothers another dream: “Behold, the sun and the moon and eleven stars bowed down to me.” Here Joseph spoke of the fact that he wants to be initiated in the sixth degree. - Let us throw him into a pit, said the brothers. The “pit” is the place of initiation. A “wild beast” has torn Joseph apart. The tearing of the earthly garments is the dying of the lowly. The story shows us that Joseph has grown up to become a sun-runner, a sun-hero. Egypt was the place of those temples where the most highly initiated were. The seventh degree is the degree of the “fathers.” Abraham belonged to the fathers only in Chaldea. Moses could then also be initiated into the Egyptian mysteries through Joseph, and from this emerged what Moses spoke to his people. This is a brief example of the kind of instruction that Philo gave his students. The scholars had no idea that these were spiritual processes, but believed that real historical events were being described. But now we also understand why there is nothing left for biblical criticism. It does not stick to the real content, which it lets slip through its fingers. The Jews of the first Christian communities told the story of Jesus' initiation in a similar way. The key to this lies in the old commentaries that exist for the Bible and the Vedas. [Spiritual processes that must be read esoterically are also the fairy tales, for example, “The Seven Little Goats.” - The outer criticism always lets the real content slip through; it takes the symbols as deeds. - The keys are not available to external scholarship; it does not know how to read such things.) Next time, I will discuss one of the most significant stories that you have often heard, but whose inner meaning is as infinitely deep as hardly anything else – the story of Cain and Abel. On the one hand, we have Cain's murder, and on the other hand, the whole human race is derived from Cain. The great secret lies in Abel, who sacrificed the animals of the forest, and Cain, who sacrificed the fruits of the field. |
90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: The Principle of Correlation
12 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: The Principle of Correlation
12 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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Imagine an animal in which one group of organs is highly developed. This is not possible unless another group is less developed. We see this principle of correlation everywhere in nature. The most diverse things come into consideration, not spatial relationships, for example, as one might object with the elephant. Goethe says it well: “Something can be added to no part without something being taken away from another.” The entire seven-round formation of the earthly planet has the purpose of bringing the human being to recognize itself in the outside world. We have the task of entering into mutual exchange with the outside world through the senses, mind and other activities. For this we need a nervous system that absorbs and forms a central point: the spinal cord. We could not feel pleasure and pain, not through interaction with the outside world, through perception alone. Cognition must be added to pleasure and pain. Cognition of the cause of pleasure and pain is impossible without a nervous system. The nervous system did not exist in the lunarian epoch, although pleasure and pain were felt even more finely. The lunarian epoch developed what became the bed of the nervous system: the skeleton. Pain lived dull in the astral consciousness without perception. Nature forms more completely in the lunarian epoch without using the strength of its budget on the nervous system. Now the law of correlation enters here. The purpose of the earthly epoch is to form the nervous system, and the knowledge of the external world that is thereby imparted is to be carried over to the other epoch. For this purpose of forming the nervous system, the organs must be trained in such a way that they become subservient, aligned with it; education must be rebuilt. Three rounds had to be used to repeat what had happened earlier. Kama must be suppressed in order to develop knowledge and perception. Lungs and heart were developed in such a way that pleasure and pain could be felt in a sophisticated way; subjectively raised to the highest possible level. Now they had to be suppressed to such an extent that perception and knowledge were developed – certain parts were suppressed in order to put the others at the service of the others. These extracted parts formed the mineral kingdom in the first round. Growth and reproduction, the vegetable kingdom, were also more complete in the lunar epoch; these were expelled in the second round. We had this within us earlier, but now we could not cope with it and so we expelled it, leaving it to the elemental spirits. Then we had to release the animal kingdom and leave it to its own devices in order to be able to form the human kingdom. To develop our nervous strength, we had to work with a different kind of strength on the material that he had in abundance - the abundance of astral life, of pleasure and pain that he was still allowed to experience in the lunar epoch. Man had to externalize some of the lion's rage, for example, so that the power that overcomes it remains behind for other purposes - cosmic guilt! We have withdrawn the taming power in order to form a power capable of cognition; thus we owe our human height to the withdrawal of a power which would otherwise have organized Kama. So that this Kama remains unorganized, it would be nonsense to speak of guilt in the context of the furious struggle for existence among animals. Let us continue the thought in earthly development; the ascetic must give and thereby replace what he withdraws. The devotional nature of man could therefore not emerge in the lunar epoch - the empires existed in a completely different way - the lowest became the eighth sphere, which is now scattered. Man now has the spiritual part of the animal that was still in him at that time, so that we do not have to imagine man directly as an animal in the lunar epoch. It was the highest flowering of passion, while now its degeneration appears in the animal. So back then there was no “good and evil for passion; that is only a characteristic of our epoch. Only now can it become evil because a power has been withdrawn from it and it has been pushed down.” Now reason, which used to be guided, begins to be left to its own devices and sometimes lapses into atavism; in the Atlanteans, development was in their midst. In our fifth race, we have somewhat passed the low point, and relapses occur: an unconscious memory of good and evil that lay beyond consciousness. For example, Nietzsche's philosophy. It was right at a time when there was no philosophizing, but this power to guide passion was – that is why evil appears as a displaced good. It is disharmonious because it is out of place at the moment. Now what had the educational instinct back then is out of place. “Whoever says there is an evil in itself blasphemes God,” says the Bible. ‘Why do you call me perfect, only the Father is perfect.’ So there is no such thing as an evil in itself, evil is only the misplaced good. Only he who takes the power to rule by overcoming can be a ruler. |
90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: The Concept of Objective Presence and Subjective Perception
13 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: The Concept of Objective Presence and Subjective Perception
13 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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The eye is called upon to perceive. Sensation – perception – can only arise when a nervous system begins to develop. Half of the eye is a living physical apparatus; the other half is permeated by the nervous system. The optic nerve would never perceive if the physical were not constructed in a certain way; with the same physical laws as an inanimate apparatus, plus life. So these two things are to be formed in humans: an apparatus to receive and one to mediate. Outside in nature we have the mineral kingdom, and the mineral kingdom has given us the apparatus, which is formed from the components of the same kingdom, with which we absorb this kingdom. Everything in the outside world we also have; little by little we have to absorb the whole mineral kingdom. In the fourth round, we assimilate the mineral kingdom, and by the end of the fourth round we will have consumed the entire kingdom. During the first round, we expose the mineral, while during the fourth we absorb it. During the second, the same thing happens with the plants, while during the third, the same thing happens with the animals. During the seventh, man is within himself; he has absorbed all the realms. How does this happen? In the nineteenth century, the materialistic one, people began to completely deny the life force. For example, urea, which was previously thought to be produced only by the organism, was produced in the laboratory. The researchers thought that if they could now chemically represent what was previously believed to come from the living, there would be no difference between the living and the inanimate, only a more complex organism. They should have said: there is life in the mineral too. Man is first able to recognize the inorganic, only later will plant and animal life be understood. The sense by which the nerve spreads perceives the mineral process from the outside. But the nerve will then grasp the life contained in the eye, grasp the incoming prana as we do today with light. The eye will have progressed so far that the plant will flow in directly. The mineral has ceased to exist. The mineral has reached its greatest density in the fourth round and will soon disintegrate into cosmic dust. Therefore, the stone is the image of perfection within our round, and the leaf is the nearest cover. The image of the jewel in the middle of the lotus flower is the symbol of the tendency of human striving today. Buddha sitting in the lotus flower is such a symbol. Today, the human being perceives so strongly in a mineral way that the researcher even denies everything else. But within him is the life - prana - that now takes everything assimilated with it through the pralaya and possesses the processed as a spiritual inner life, as something absorbed within him. - So in each round, until the human being - absorbing everything - remains only in God. During the first round, man had developed his physical self, the bone system emerged in the system; in the second round it was animated, man became a plant. It is hollow, the plant as an outline. In the fifth round, he will have the core within him. The human being as a plant-human being in the second round reproduces, life begets life. In the first round, unity prevailed; in the second, number, the emergence of one from the other. Form also prevails – shape – because number comes together. In the third round, the beings begin to live within themselves. Reciprocity rules – pleasure and pain. Something new begins in the fourth round. Until now, there was still a shell everywhere. The mineral kingdom begins to form a core. We are only now able to distinguish between shell and core. The core can separate and control ever new shells. Birth and death prevail. The core can retain a germ that outlasts all shells, and we experience birth and death. In the first three rounds up to the middle of the fourth, the daughter essence is released from the mother essence; it separates. Everything was there as long as the round lasted; only with the fourth round is birth and death possible. The first is unity, which dominates the first round. The second is number, which dominates the second round. The third is interdependency, which dominates the third round. The fourth is birth and death, which dominate the fourth round. The union of the Pitri with the Dhyan Chohan is the core. [...] |
90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: The Following Rounds
15 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: The Following Rounds
15 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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The fact that a nucleus enters the shells within the fourth round means that this nucleus can maintain itself while the shells fall away. Birth and death. This falling away and ever-evolving in the fourth round is the mineral kingdom. The substance itself is now immortal. Through the fact that a core has been preserved, which finds an external point of reference in the nervous system, manas has been able to connect with the human being. Only man is kama-manasic. On the one hand, there is now birth and death and thus bisexuality. Before the fourth round, there was no bisexual animal sex. Only when Manas moves into the nervous system does it withdraw the power from the covers to produce a uniform one. They must first be stimulated. What sexuality offers from the outside is what used to be from the inside. The combining activity of the mind replaces the earlier productive creation out of itself; Manas withdraws the single sex. Animals with only one sex have so far had no manasic spark. Man, by setting the animal sex aside [gap in the transcript], gave it the dual sex as a thank-you gift. The manasic wants to work outwardly - that is why the human race was mute in the third round and is still animal; only the animal that forms the transition becomes vocal. Voice and sexuality are two poles that are closely related. In the fourth round, language will develop higher and higher - the danger of sexuality will lead ever deeper and deeper. The productive power stepped inward into the core and was forced out as a word during the fourth round. Word and sexuality are the outer character of the human being. Manas now has the task of becoming the core controller, the regulator for what has now come to the outside - evil, passion. All this is taken over as a germ into the fifth round. A new series of organs will become the means of expression. The lungs, the respiratory organ, which had developed into the larynx, the speech organ. In the fifth round, the heart and circulatory organs will give birth to their own organ of expression. As he now radiates the word, he will radiate his entire inner being, and it will be impossible for man to separate his own good from the good of others. As Manas is now radiated through the word, Budhi will be radiated through the heart and will immediately embrace. Those who have not yet reached this stage will be savages! This is the normal development. With the word one can still wound, but with the heart-breath it is impossible. We must try to reshape the word so that it can no longer wound:
The purpose of this is for the word, no longer wounding, to withdraw into the core and develop the heart. The heart thus steps outwards – sexuality falls away and becomes the body shell that is now formed through birth and death. Just as the productive power had driven sexuality outwards, giving rise to good and evil, so now he pushes evil outwards. The outer form is woven from what are now the passions. The outer countenance will be exactly what he is now preparing as good and evil. With the badge of their passion, [men] will be born. As evil is now their inner power, they carry it outward in the fifth round. The fifth round will divide humanity into those of Cain and those of Zeichen, through the revelation of the secret. This is the esoteric meaning, which is completely distorted in the Christian Last Judgment. The sixth round is more difficult to describe. The organ that has now become established, the heart, has become so expansive that it pours outwards. In the fifth round, the word is inner strength; it pushes the heart organ outwards and is still an inspirer. In the sixth round, everything goes outwards, the human being becomes completely heart, the word is his outer body, the human being becomes sound waves, the heart blood has pushed itself completely outwards, the sound will sprout - the animal thought is realized, what pushes from within has become meaningful word, walking language. That is why we must learn to stand before the masters. The lifeblood has flowed outwards, the human being has become clay. [Gap in the transcript] In the sixth round, the outer being is the word itself, the clay, and the inner being is the human being himself, who lives completely. Now in the seventh round, he is what he is, the self-conscious man of thought, who is blissfully happy within himself. A state of blissful divinity, no distinction between the outer and the inner. So during the fourth round, freedom came into the world, and it is in our hands to become as little as possible like Cain. Thus Lucifer is the bringer of light, but at the same time he brought evil into the world: It is in your hands to become Cain or Abel. This was presented to the Greeks in all its terrible magnitude in the mysteries. Without the possibility of destruction, man could never have become free. |
90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: The Main Law of All Round Evolution
16 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: The Main Law of All Round Evolution
16 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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Each round runs in seven sections, namely the three [gap in the transcript], the middle one, which is the turning point, main point, and the decisive one, and the three receding ones, where everything turns inward. The descending movement is always delayed; there is a decrease and delay in the evolution of the first three states, now the slowest, and then an increasing speed, an acceleration until the seventh has the same movement as the first. We have created three different states:
In each subsequent round, these states are briefly repeated, and this happens in the first rounds. So we have little to deal with in the first three rounds because they are a brief repetition. In the fourth round, the first state is also a brief repetition. We divide this again into three parts – seven races into three parts. Seven-thirds – two-thirds and one-third is what we now have to imagine. So we have two first races: preparatory race; the third is still preparatory in its first third, and in the second third the characteristic of the race begins. The further two and one third give four and two thirds. So we have the next state until the second third of the fifth race. And from the last third of the fifth race, the flooding takes place again. Our fifth has an important turning point, namely that of the flooding, where we have to draw the last conclusions and lead the development over to the sixth race, where the preparatory work for the future round will take place. In the first races, therefore: none Confessions:
Thinking knowledge is what must be striven for and accomplished in the fifth race. It is the task - the struggle for knowledge from P [gap in the transcript] to the sacral [gap in the transcript] To bring concepts to life in man. Before man could come to conceptual knowledge, he first had to form ideas. The fourth [race] thus had the task of developing the power of imagination. The Atlantean was the imaginative race, while the Aryan is the thinking one. The Atlantean is memory and imagination. The doctrine of reincarnation [the Atlanteans] did not have, but they had the memory of previous incarnation. Atlantean temples consisted of busts of the Atlanteans, who were interested in seeing their earlier image. Lemurians also did not yet have the ability to form ideas. Before them, people still picked out colors and tuned their ears. The ability to form sensations began with the third race. To take in sensations from the outside. Cis. G., color. They live entirely in the present. At the beginning of the Lemurian race, we have the attachment to the spinal cord - nerve cord and attachment to the brain. There were no other bodies. In the Atlantean period, the formation continues until the forebrain develops in the Aryan - the thinking brain. Avatar:
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90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: Reincarnation And Karma
18 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: Reincarnation And Karma
18 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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When observing individual development, one should not limit oneself to human beings, because their development is only a special case in the whole of nature. Development is the change of day and night, everything that takes place in time, ebb and flow - a similar thing takes place everywhere in inanimate nature: changes in temporal events. What remains [in this changeable] is the law. In spring, the sun is in a certain constellation, that of Aries - on March 21. It was the symbol of the Logos – the ram or lamb is therefore the sign of the re-appeared solar Logos: the Lamb of God. Greek Argonaut saga: the rams, the sun god, is brought home. The sun follows the same law. What changes is the appearance and what allows the appearance to repeat itself in the same rhythmic play is the law. But in a certain sense, the law also changes. Eight hundred years before Christ, the sun began to rise in Aries, earlier in Taurus; very slowly it moves on. Therefore, the Egyptians had the sacred bull ‹Apis›, also the Persians. As long as the sun moved in the sign of Taurus, it was worshiped like that. Before that, the sun rose in Gemini, and we hear of its worship among ancient peoples, among the Persians, and also among the ancient Germans. About every two thousand years, the sun moves forward very slowly. So the law is relatively constant, but it also undergoes development. The law is the constant, the eternally changing is the phenomenon. Let us now move from inanimate to animate nature. The individual plant continually dies, but the species emerges from the seed. Just as in inanimate nature the phenomena pass away and the law remains, so in animate nature the species is preserved and the individuals perish. This applies to the plant and animal world. But here, too, the species remains and changes at the same time over the course of time: the tame city pigeon has developed from the rock dove. The essence of the species remains, but something changes. How did the species undergo this development? Through the external living conditions in which the species find themselves. The effect of the external on the internal changes the species. Everything that previously came upon a being as external circumstances subsequently becomes a process of further development in the being itself. The caves of Kentucky deprive the animal of its sight; the animal absorbs the darkness. The sun would remain if other powerful celestial bodies did not continue to move it. Every being absorbs and then develops itself further. Every process of further development is therefore interaction. The animal develops itself in such a way that it provides for the next generation. Let us now move up to the level of personality. It is capable of imagining and can therefore enter into a new type of living conditions and absorb spiritual impressions. It enters into a new, spiritual environment. Just as in the species, the process of further development is formed in the personality through the new spiritual conditions. Personality passes away like the phenomenon and the individual, and like the law and the species, individuality remains. It would be a violation of the law if it were otherwise, and so we understand reincarnation. The spiritual essence of the personality is absorbed from within by the living conditions, and develops further. This is the agreement of the law of reincarnation with that of the preservation of the species and the law. When we follow the developing species, we observe the adaptation to external living conditions, which is then inherited. Adaptation and inheritance are the great laws that govern living nature. All inheritance is a transfer of acquired characteristics to the heirs. When I look at the pouter pigeon, I will only understand it if I go back to its ancestors and look for the causes that gave rise to its organs. The present formations must be sought in the activities of times gone by. What was previously an activity later becomes an organ. The same thing happens spiritually with the individuality. It adapts and passes on to the successor of the personality the individuality it has acquired in the spiritual realm. What is taken in through experience is furthered in the process of development. Take the bean: it develops to the germ, everything else falls away, only the small part remains, and that dies off, only life itself with the species passes over to the offspring plant. Only the species remains, but when it became a germ, the bean species itself was still surrounded by a part of vegetable matter, which must also fall away. The developed plant is no longer the species, but it has something of the sheaths that the germ has to save. Only when everything has fallen away can it arise anew. It is a new incarnation. Just as in individuality, which is surrounded by all sheaths and can only incarnate when all remnants have fallen away. Man has even more sheaths; they must return to where they came from. Then his germ is free and single, in the world in which alone it can develop - to a new existence. Man belongs to the earth, without it he would be inconceivable. He can only exist under this atmospheric pressure; this also applies to the spiritual conditions. This is because he has developed into this earth, into its physical, astral and mental spheres, which are interwoven. The human being is constructed from these three spheres as an earthly human being. The individuality itself is only in the higher mind, which is not bound to the earth, but belongs to the solar sphere; the earth with its three spheres, but also the sun and all other planets, rests in it. So we still consist of a substance that does not change, the unwritten page in which the experiences are recorded. We call the mental sphere, in so far as it belongs to the earth, “Rupa”, formed; the other, which extends, “Arup”, mental. This is where [the] individuality belongs. We are children of the sun in a certain respect, which is why we also call our teachers sun children. Just as the plant slowly returns all the substances it has taken in to build itself, keeping only what is of the species, so the human being - individuality - retains only what is arupa, mental, in order to reincarnate. Arupa is the region that leads out of the earth into the general. Then it is the freed butterfly that can spread freely in the Arupa-Mental, then [gap in the transcript] it must return to experience anew. When man has given up his physical, he also has to give back to the astral what has served his construction from there, then he lives in Kamaloka. What he learns in this life becomes an inclination, it must develop in Arupa, then it will reach full development. Man is not only an earthling, but also a sun child through his belonging to the sphere. In the third race the spark was ignited. Where did this spark come from, which the Manasaputra brought? The first knowledge was not given earthly, but brought over from an earlier state; it is something that goes beyond the sphere of action; so it remains when these effects cease. Only by the fact that man is able to pass through Arupa does he remain, otherwise he would have to shatter. But in the same way, the progressive development of the spiritual is a law that applies to individuality. The external becomes the internal, what is experienced externally becomes the inner principle of progress. What comes to the individuality becomes inner law. The stream of the macrocosm flows into the individual and thus becomes microcosm. Predispositions are the results of previous experience: our conscience is previous experience. Just as in the study of nature, we have to explain it; that is the law of karma: causation through the various incarnations. You have the cause for a present-day disposition in an earlier activity. Vedanta: What you think today, you are tomorrow. Reincarnation means: the preservation of the spiritual in the physical. Karma means: what is first an activity later becomes a habit or trait. |
90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: What Does Man Gain From Knowing His Past?
20 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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90a. Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge I: What Does Man Gain From Knowing His Past?
20 Jun 1904, Berlin |
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Through his past he comes to know his future. He connects the past with the future. The ancients called death the brother of sleep. What we are today is a continuation of yesterday; sleep connects, yesterday is the cause of today's karma. Man maintains himself by building on the past. This is how it is with the human race. We learn our past in order to control our future; we also learn about the present from the future. More highly developed people like Plato have brought more to revelation from the higher basic parts than others; others must become what he was. Plato is an artificial five-rounder. Buddha, Christ, Zarathustra are six-rounders. They, too, continue to develop. At the end of the seventh round, humanity will have reached a certain degree of harmonious development. The lunarian epoch only became disharmonious as a new principle. It will be the same at the end of the seventh round. Sin is not from God, it came into the world through the law, but the law is from God, according to Paul. Manas approached Kama to take it to a new level. Kama had to be integrated, sawed and filed, like a wheel for a clock. Through the law; Kama or the flesh in itself was good. At the end of our terrestrial epoch, the firstlings come with a far higher development than the harmonious development of the masses. Theosophy calls it the Dhyan Chohans. So it was at the end of the lunar epoch: the first Pitris were so advanced and came over to undergo a development in the earth epoch that went beyond the regular. They could only intervene when the earth beings could feel something of Manas within themselves. They were first active in the formation of humans in order to be understood by them later. [For example: the] Elohim of the Old Testament were only understood when the spark of the spirit was awakened in them [humans]. In particular, they were able to understand Jahve-Elohim, the Lord of Form, who clothed everything with the physical shell. The great teachers, Sons of Light, Manasaputras, had appeared in this way - teaching. In revelation, everything can only appear in polarity, in two forms; man must understand through opposites; he enjoys the light when he sees the shadow. Here, too, polarity appeared in God Michael - Yahweh - and Lucifer. Yahweh-Elohim and his group are destined to direct man's intellect to the external in form; the other group directs attention more to the purely spiritual, to the inner being in man. Thus, God and the serpent appear in myths as opposites: God wants to teach love; the serpent wants to teach wisdom. God wants to teach form; the serpent wants to teach life. The differentiation into imagination and sensuality, into sexuality, which had not existed before, now occurred. With it, language, as an expression of imagination. So that two kinds of intelligence were at work: “You shall know!” said Lucifer, and imparted speech with thinking. He imparted the inner life. Jehovah was the God of form and procreation, and also of love — who hallowed outer sensuality through nobler feelings. “You shall bear children with pain. We thus see the intervention of higher intelligences in the form of the God of love and the God of wisdom. When love was to become personality in Jesus, the head of the serpent had to be crushed. So we have the three currents: Lunarian Pitris in germ form, which are animated by the mineral kingdom and have to mature to receive the influence of the Elohim. The Elohim have the task of leading up to this point. So that in the first three rounds the normal entities progress until they are mature to connect with the Elohim and to progress together with them. What happened is what is described as the fall into matter, the Fall of Man. Humanity only became aware of sensuality when it was there, so they made clothes out of leaves. The Sons of Form and Love and the Sons of Wisdom now led people until the fourth race, in which something new occurred. The Sons of Wisdom have to do with thinking and imagining; the Sons of Love with the sanctification of human sensuality. This is the greatest task, for it is to be led to divinity. It is difficult because in sensuality there is desire, longing - that is, the tendency to remain within sensuality. First there was the fall into matter; now there is the tendency to remain within it, if it is not pointed upwards. It was a sacrifice of the Sons of Light to become the leaders of sensuality, a greater sacrifice than becoming the leaders of thinking. The Sons of Light are exposed to all the dangers of sensuality; it became more and more seductive the more they developed it. And the result was the subjugation of some of the Sons of Light under the power of matter. This led to the great catastrophes of the Atlantean period. This is what is called black magic. The second case is when the danger became a trap for some of the Sons of Light: material selfishness instead of guidance from matter. The flood - mythical account. The Sons of Light found the Earth Daughters beautiful: This sex had to succumb. They threw off what could not be taken. And now we have what came next; our savages are the decadent descendants of those ancient races that perished. Within Asia, there were those who had retained their equilibrium and progressed to the fifth race. This small part went to India, partly to Babylonia, Egypt, Europe and so on. What happened then is happening today on a higher level of consciousness. Today, a geographical area - the ark - cannot be isolated. Today, instead of spatial isolation, there must be isolation of thought and attitude. Even now individuals can incarnate from the Atlanteans who perished – only their culture and their geographical soil were destroyed. The culture of the fifth race, too, will be destroyed if it becomes evil. Some of it must be gathered to form the basis of the sixth race, united by that which will form the core: love. We must now collect in the spirit of love, we must consciously do what was once done unconsciously – calling from all nations to the brotherhood. We have the high task of being for the sixth race what was once done for the fifth. Those who have an interest in the future culture are working on it. Those who do nothing for it will also enjoy the fruits; if the perished Atlanteans had found what they had sown, they would have found a hell; so too would the fifth race find it in the sixth if we did not work to prepare new karma for the sixth race. What we sow, we will reap, also in terms of racial karma. |