The Rudolf Steiner Archive

In the series of "University Lectures for Everyone", one has been published that introduces the history of the origins of the German stage. Prof. Dr. Georg Witkowski deals with the topic: "The beginnings of the German theater". With the brevity necessitated by his task, he shows that this important factor in our intellectual life did not take its place in German cultural life until very late. In the Middle Ages there was no real theater in Germany. The content of serious poetry, which appeared in dramatic form, was taken from biblical history, and its presentation followed the church service. Scenes from the Old and New Testaments were performed at Easter and Christmas. They did not have the purpose, which every real dramatic poem must have, of presenting soul struggles for their own sake; they wanted to present sacred history in a vividly vivid way. Nor can the comic performances that were put on by craftsmen and schoolchildren at carnival time really be described as dramatic performances. They mostly dealt with small court scenes, marital disputes and crude jokes, which usually mocked the peasants from the townspeople's point of view.... The actors traveled from house to house, acting out their roles without any scenic means and certainly developed a very low level of acting skill, because where would that come from for the brave craftsmen and students? After the Reformation, conditions in Germany were more favorable for drama. Luther favored student performances because he believed that they had a positive influence on public opinion. "Comedies should not be hindered for the sake of the boys at school, but should be permitted and allowed, firstly, that they practise the Latin language, and secondly, that in comedies such characters are artificially condensed, painted and portrayed in a fine way, so that the people can be instructed, and everyone is reminded and admonished of his office and station, what is proper for a servant, master, young journeyman and old man, and what he should do; indeed, all degrees of dignity, offices and duties are held up and presented to the eyes, as in a mirror, how everyone should conduct himself in his station in his outward behavior. " In the period that followed, the drama of guilt flourished. But it could not achieve much, because the views on the nature of dramatic technique were of the most primitive kind. It did not go beyond a dialog spread over several characters. The impetus for a truly dramatic art in Germany came from the English. This developed with admirable speed at the end of the sixteenth century. The first theater building was erected in London in 1576, and by the end of the century there were more such artistic institutions in the city than there are today. And just as quickly, English drama developed from simple plays with religious and moral-didactic tendencies to the masterpieces of Shakespeare.

The art that developed there was also brought to Germany by traveling troupes of actors. In 1586, one such troupe, led by William Kempe, arrived at the Dresden court. From this time onwards, these companies of comedians appeared in a wide variety of places. They put on English plays, sometimes in an unheard-of corruption. However, plays were also written by Germans and performed by such companies. The leader of such a troupe usually played the leading role, which had to be a comic character. The plays that were performed had to be put into a form that allowed the leader to appear as this typical comic figure. - We have knowledge of these performances almost exclusively through the council minutes and tax tables of the cities, which show us what burdens the authorities imposed on the traveling troupes. There were no theater reviews or anything similar at this time. - The dramatic art in Germany had the character indicated here during the last years of the sixteenth and the first third of the seventeenth century. Witkowski shares a playbill from Nuremberg that gives us a glimpse of what was on offer: "Everyone should know that a whole new company of comedians is arriving here, who have never before been seen here in this country, with a very funny pickelhering, who will perform daily, beautiful comedies, tra; pastorelles (Schäffereyen) and histories, mixed with sweet and funny interludes, and today they will present a very funny comedy called "Die Liebes Süßigkeit verändert sich in Todes Bitterkeit. After the comedy, a beautiful ballet and ridiculous farce will be presented. The lovers of such plays want to gather at the fencing house after noon bell 2, where the praecise is to begin at the appointed time." Regarding the expression Pickelhering, which means kipper, it should be noted that the aforementioned comic figure at the center of the performances gave himself names of popular foods: Hans Wurst, Hans Knapkäse, Stockfisch and so on. - After 1631, the situation changed. The English troops were lost; they were replaced by "High German comedians".

Witkowski's description of the stage at that time is worthy of special mention:

"Long beforehand, the wide space of the courtyard, which can hold a very large number of people, is densely packed. In front of the door, those entering have found a plaque on which it is written that a person's place costs six kreuzer. Normally the English have often asked for more, but this time they are not allowed to. The audience, who had paid the large sum (the German troops only got half a kreuzer), sat in front of and around the stage, which bore little resemblance to the one we see today. It consisted of a small scaffolding that was erected against the back wall of the courtyard and only took up a small part of it. It was open on three sides, only at the back was it covered with carpets, in front of which you could see a smaller raised scaffolding with stairs leading up to it. This served a dual purpose. Firstly, its platform was always used when an elevation, a city wall, a hill or a tower was needed. On the other hand, its interior was used to create a second stage on the stage, on which the scenes that took place in the chambers of the houses were performed. This second stage was equipped with decorations and could be closed off by a curtain so that it could be transformed while the front part of the scene was being played; an extremely practical insight that greatly benefited the structure of the dramas. Later, the width of the stage was extended over the whole back wall of the building in which they played, thus producing the present form of our theater, which is far removed from the former simple and yet so sensible use of the English.

But we already find the important principle of the front and back stage with them; the original cell, so to speak, of the present stage is already there."

In Germany itself, at the time when the theater was under the influence of the English, only dramatic poems were created, which were worthless for the real theater. They were inspired by the Greeks and Romans. It was not until Moliere and the French art developed by him that anything fruitful emerged again in Germany. A complete decline of the theater in the first half of the eighteenth century was followed by a revival thanks to Gottsched, who worked together with the brilliant stage artist Neuber. Even if the French influence has been freed from Germany again, this influence can only be described as extremely favorable at this time.

From a teaching session in Munich, December 12, 1906

With our prayer “Brothers of the Past...” we show that we are connecting with the work of the Brothers of the Past, the Brothers of the Present and the Brothers of the Future, the Mahatmas.

From an instructional lesson in Hanover, Christmas 1911

We should know and feel within the walls of our temple that with these symbols surrounding us, the forces of the wise masters of the East are flowing in upon us. When we look up to those who have guided the whole evolution of humanity from the very beginning of the world, through the evolution of Saturn, Sun, Moon, to the evolution of the earth, to our present time, we turn in prayer, seeking help for our present evolution, to those we call “Brothers of the Past”. And so we pray: “Brothers of the past...”. When we look up to those who are currently guiding us spiritually, we pray: “Brothers of the present...”. And those who will be the guides of humanity in the future, we address as “Brothers of the future...”.

From the instruction session in Hanover, December 31, 1911

The wise masters of the East are beings who belong to the three higher worlds and who work in the past, present and future, as it were, and whom we imagine to be above us when we say our prayers. From the instruction session in Munich, September 5, 1912

The first prayer distinguishes us from all other such endeavors that rely on documents or on a traditional wisdom. We do not refer to anything of the sort; we only tie in with the work that has been done, with what has actually been achieved.

In the near future, among other things that will be undertaken against us, our occult movement will also be tried to be discredited and vilified, so we should know this, to which we are joining. In the spiritual realm, there is a community like ours, but it has only as much justification as there are souls who profess it as the truth. And anyone who does not like something about it does not need to be part of it. We do not claim to be an order, a Rosicrucian movement or anything of the kind, but our aim is to represent the truth in such a way that we do not claim wisdom as our own, but we do want to appropriate the work that has flowed from it as wisdom.

Wisdom is there. There was an ancient store of wisdom belonging to humanity, as shown in the “Dwellers in the Threshold” by the Grand Master [1st picture]. And how one has to relate to it, that is, how one advances in the occult life, is shown to us by Maria in the second scene with Thomasius. It would be more convenient to give a prescription for all, but it had to be shown in our Western movement how persons of the special kind of a Thomasius, Strader, Capesius and a Maria go the initiation way.

“Compasses and Rule” means: We adopt your customs.

Such prayers contain in their words everything we need, as do the “Mysteries Dramas”. Every word is there in its place and full of occult meaning. Nothing, nothing is set and said for a reason other than its spiritual meaning and power, as it is.

The opponents of the spiritual, such as Haeckel, carry the spiritual deeply hidden within themselves and their rage and anger is actually directed against themselves. Because they cannot access their subconscious soul life in life, they show themselves quite differently towards the spiritual after death and are most easily quoted, for example, in spiritualistic séances.

Nietzsche is very interesting in this respect. He had a hard time letting go of his material part. That is why he presented such a strange sight to the seer, even in his illness: the man Nietzsche, this strange personality, lying on the sofa and the aura around him.¹ The split of the ego is expressed in such personalities: while the consciousness is materialistic, the subconscious is spiritual.

“Brothers of the Future”: We don't have a name either, because Lucifer is the inspiration for every external foundation of an association or society.

From a lecture in Bremen, April 9, 1906

To be an apprentice means to make up for what our brothers have achieved in the distant past; to be a journeyman means to be allowed to live with the older brothers of humanity; to be a master means to be allowed to work on the building of the temple.

From a lecture in Berlin, January 29, 1906.

As I have often said, it was not by chance that the Theosophical Society was founded in the last third of the 19th century. The way in which it seeks the spiritual differs significantly from other endeavors that also strive to obtain proof of the immortality of man. There is a great diversity in the search for the eternal as it is found in the Theosophical Society and the search for the eternal in other spiritual currents. In truth, the theosophical movement is nothing more than the popular expression of the secret fraternities of the past millennia that have secretly embraced the world. I have already mentioned that the most outstanding and greatest of these brotherhoods in Europe was founded in the 14th century as the Rosicrucian Brotherhood. This Rosicrucian Brotherhood is actually the source and the starting point for all the other brotherhoods that have preserved European culture. In these brotherhoods, occult wisdom was cultivated in strict secrecy. If I were to characterize for you what the people united in these various brotherhoods wanted to achieve, I would have to tell you that the high and exalted teachings and work of wisdom cultivated in these occult brotherhoods, of which the Rosicrucian Brotherhood was the most outstanding, brought people to the point where they became aware of their own eternal essence. They brought man to the point where he found the connection with the higher world, with the worlds that lie above us, and looked to the guidance of our older brothers, to the guidance of those who live among us and have attained a level that you will all attain at a later time. We call them the older brothers because, ahead of the general development, they have reached this high point earlier: thus the certainty of the eternal essence of the being, the awakening of it, so that man can see the eternal as the ordinary man sees the world of the senses. To achieve this, one must emulate the older brothers who live among us everywhere. These elder brothers or masters, the great guides of humanity, have always been the supreme directors and supreme directors of the occult sublime wisdom through which man becomes aware of his eternal essence.

• 1. Refers to Rudolf Steiner's impression when he was able to visit the sick Nietzsche. See “My Life”, GA 28.

[ 1 ] When leaving thy body behind thee thou soarest up into the ether,
Then thou becomest a god, immortal, beyond the power of death.

In this utterance of Empedocles (cf. p. 46) is epitomized what the ancient Egyptians thought about the eternal clement in man and its connection with the Divine. Proof of this may be found in the so-called Book of the Dead, which has been deciphered by the diligence of nineteenth-century scholars.¹ It is “the greatest coherent literary work that has come down to us from ancient Egypt.” It contains all kinds of instructions and prayers that were put into the tomb of each deceased person to serve as a guide when he was released from his mortal tenement. The most intimate ideas of the Egyptians about the eternal and the origin of the world are contained in this work. These views point to a conception of the gods similar to that of Greek mysticism.

Osiris gradually became the preëminent and most universally recognized of the various deities worshipped in different parts of Egypt. In him were comprized the ideas about the other divinities. Whatever the majority of the Egyptian people may have thought about Osiris, the Book of the Dead indicates that the priestly wisdom saw in him a being that might be found in the human soul herself. Everything said about death and the dead shows this plainly. While the body is given to earth and kept by it, the Eternal in man enters upon the path to the primordial Eternal. It comes before the tribunal of Osiris and the forty-two judges of the dead. The fate of the Eternal in man depends on the verdict of these judges. If the soul has confessed her sins, and has been deemed reconciled to eternal justice, invisible powers approach her and say: “The Osiris N. has been purified in the pool which is south of the field of Hotep. and north of the field of Locusts, where the gods of verdure purify themselves at the fourth hour of the night and the eighth hour of the day with the image of the heart of the gods, passing from night to day.” Thus, within the eternal cosmic order the Eternal in man is itself addressed as an Osiris. After the name Osiris comes the deceased person’s own name; and the one who is uniting with the eternal cosmic order also alls himself “Osiris”. “I am the Osiris N. Growing under the blossoms of the fig-tree is the name of Osiris N.” Thus man becomes an Osiris. Being Osiris is only a perfect stage in human development. It seems obvious that even the Osiris who is a judge within the eternal cosmic order is nothing more than a perfect man, Between being human and being divine there is a difference in degree and number. The mystic view of the mystery of number underlies this. Osiris as a cosmic being is One, yet he exists, nevertheless, undivided in each human soul. Every human being is an Osiris, yet the One Osiris must be represented as a Separate being. Man is in course of development, and at the end of his evolutionary career he becomes divine. In taking this view we must speak of Divine-ness, or becoming divine, rather than of a finished divine being, complete in himself.

[ 2 ] It cannot be doubted that, according to this view, only he can really enter upon the Osiris existence who has reached the portals of the eternal cosmic order as an Osiris. Thus the highest life which man can lead must consist in his changing himself into Osiris. Even during mortal life a true man will live as a perfect Osiris as far as he can. He becomes perfect when he lives as an Osiris, when he passes through the experiences of Osiris. This lends a deeper significance to the Osiris myth. It becomes the ideal of the man who wishes to awaken the Eternal within himself.

Osiris is torn to pieces, killed by Typhon. The fragments of his body are preserved and cared for by his consort, Isis. After his death he let a ray of his own light fall upon her, and she bore him Horus. This Horus takes up the earthly tasks of Osiris. He is the second Osiris, still imperfect, but progressing towards the true Osiris.

The true Osiris is in the human soul, who at the outset is of a transitory nature; but as such she i destined to give birth to the Eternal. Man may there: fore regard himself as the tomb of Osiris. Man's lower nature (Typhon) has killed his higher nature. Love in his soul (Isis) must nurture the dead fragments of his body, and then the higher nature, the eternal soul (Horus) will be born, who can progress to Osiris existence. The man aspiring to the highest kind of existence must repeat in himself microcosmically the macrocosmic universal Osiris process. This is the meaning of Egyptian initiation. What Plato (cf. p. 66) describes as a cosmic process—that the Creator has stretched the soul of the world on the body of the world in the form of a cross, and that the cosmic process is the redemption of this crucified soul,—this process had to be enacted in man on a smaller scale if he was to be qualified for Osiris-existence. The candidate for initiation had to develop himself in such a way that his soul-experience, his becoming an Osiris, blended into one with the cosmic Osiris process.

If we could look into the temples of initiation in which people underwent the transformation into Osiris, we should see that what took place represented microcosmically a cosmic genesis. Man who proceeded from the Father was to give birth to the Son in himself. What he actually bears within him, that is, Divinity under a spell, was to become manifest in him. This divinity is kept down in him by the power of the earthly nature; this lower nature must first be buried in order that the higher nature may arise.

This clarifies what we are told about the incidents of initiation. The candidate was subjected to mysterious procedures by means of which his earthly nature was killed and his higher nature awakened. It is not Necessary to study these procedures in detail if we understand their meaning. This meaning is contained in the confession possible to everyone who went through initiation. He could say: “I envisioned the endless perspective at the end of which lies the perfection of the Divine. I felt that the power of this Divine is within me. I buried what keeps down that bower in me. I died to earthly things. I was dead. I had died as a lower man; I was in the nether-world. I had intercourse with the dead, with those who have already become part of the eternal cosmic order. After my sojourn in the nether-world I arose from the dead. I overcame death, but now I have become a different being. I have nothing more to do with perishable nature. For me this has become saturated with the Logos. I now belong to those who live eternally, and who will sit at the right hand of Osiris. I myself shall be a true Osiris, part of the eternal cosmic order; and the judgment of life and death will be placed in my hands.” The candidate for initiation had to submit to the experience which made such a confession possible for him. It was an experience of the highest kind that the neophite passed through.

[ 3 ] Let us now imagine that a non-initiate hears of such experiences. He cannot know what has really taken place in the initiate’s soul. In his eyes the initiate died physically, lay in the grave, and rose again. What is a spiritual reality at a higher stage of existence appears, when expressed in the form of sense-reality, as an event which breaks through the order of nature. It is a “miracle”. In this sense initiation was a miracle. One who really wished to understand it must have awakened within himself powers to enable him to stand on a higher plane of existence. He must have approached these higher experiences through a course of life specially adapted to that purpose. In whatever way these prepared experiences took place in individual cases, they are always found to be of quite a definite type; so an initiate’s life is a typical one. It may be described quite apart from the single personality. In fact, an individual could only be described as being on the way to the Divine if he had passed through these definite typical experiences.

Such a personality was Buddha, living in the midst of his disciples. Jesus appeared as such a personality to his followers. Nowadays we know of the parallelism that exists between the biographies of Buddha and of Jesus. Rudolf Seydel has convincingly proved this parallelism in his book, Buddha und Christus. We have only to follow out the two lives in detail in order to see that all objections to the parallelism are futile.

[ 4 ] The birth of Buddha is announced by a white elephant that descends from heaven and declares to the queen, Maya, that she will bring forth a divine man who “will attune all beings to love and friendship, and will unite them in a close alliance.” We read in St. Luke’s Gospel: “To a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. And the angel came in unto her, and said, ‘Hail, thou that art highly favoured... Behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest.”

The Brahmins, or Indian priests, who know what the birth of a Buddha means, interpret Maya’s dream. They have a definite, typical idea of a Buddha, to which the life of the personality about to be born will have to correspond. Similarly we read in Matthew II, 1, that when Herod “had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he demanded of them where Christ should be born.” The Brahmin Asita says of Buddha: “This is the child which will become Buddha, the redeemer, the leader to immortality, freedom, and light.” Compare with this Luke 11, 25: “And, behold, there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon; and the same man was just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel: and the Holy Ghost was upon him ... And when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him after the custom of the law, then took he him up in his arms, and blessed God, and said, Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word: for mine eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people: a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel.”

It is related of Buddha that at the age of twelve he was lost, and found again under a tree, surrounded by poets and sages of the olden time, whom he was teaching. With this incident the following passage in St. Luke corresponds: “Now his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the feast of the passover. And when he was twelve years old, they went up to Jerusalem after the custom of the feast. And when they had fulfilled the days, as they returned, the child Jesus tarried behind in Jerusalem; and Joseph and his mother knew not of it. But they, supposing him to have been in the company, went a day's journey; and they sought him among their kinsfolk and acquaintance. And when they found him not, they turned back again to Jerusalem, seeking him. And it came to pass that after three days they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them, and asking them questions. And all that heard him were astonished at his understanding and answers.” (Luke II, 41-47).

After Buddha had lived in solitude and returned, he was received by the benediction of a virgin, “Blessed is thy mother, blessed is thy father, blessed is the wife to whom thou belongest.” But he replied, “Only they are blessed who are in Nirvana,” that is, who have entered the eternal cosmic order. In St. Luke’s Gospel (XI, 27), we read: “And it came to pass, as he spake these things, a certain woman of the company lifted up her voice and said unto him, ‘Blessed is the womb that bare thee, and the paps which thou hast sucked.” But he said, ‘Yea rather, blessed are they that hear the word of God, and keep it.'”

In the course of Buddha’s life, the tempter comes to him and promises him all the kingdoms of the earth. Buddha refuses everything in the words: “I know well that I am destined to have a kingdom, but I do not desire an earthly one. I shall become Buddha and make all the world exult with joy.” The tempter has to own that his reign is over. Jesus answers the same temptation in the words: “Get thee hence, Satan, for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. Then the devil leaveth him.” (Matthew IV, 10, 11). This description of the parallelism might be extended to many other points with the same result.

The life of Buddha ended sublimely. On a journey, he felt ill; he came to the river Hiranja, near Kuschinagara. There he lay down on a carpet which his favorite disciple, Ananda, spread for him. His body began to be luminous from within. He died transfigured, his body irradiating light, saying: “Nothing endures.”

The death of Buddha corresponds with the trans: figuration of Jesus. “And it came to pass about eight days after these sayings, he took Peter and John and James, and went up into a mountain to pray. And as he prayed, the fashion of his countenance was altered and his raiment was white and glistering.”

Buddha’s earthly life ends at this point, but it is here that the most important part of the life of Jesus begins—His suffering, death, and resurrection. What differentiates Buddha from Christ exists in the conditions necessitating the extension of the life of Christ Jesus beyond the scope of the Buddha life. Buddha and Christ will not be understood by merely mixing them. (This will become clear in the course of this book.) Other accounts of Buddha's death need not here be considered, even though they reveal profound aspects.

[ 5 ] The agreement in the lives of the two redeemers leads to the same conclusion. The narratives themselves indicate the nature of this conclusion. When the Priest-sages hear what kind of birth is to take place, they know what is involved. They know that they have to do with a God-Man; they know beforehand what kind of personality it is who is appearing. And therefore his course of life can only correspond with what they know about the life of a God-Man. In the Wisdom of their Mysteries such a life is traced out for all eternity. It can only be as it must be; it comes into manifestation like an eternal law of nature. Just as a chemical substance can only behave in a certain definite way, so a Buddha or a Christ can only live in A certain definite way. His life is not described merely by writing a fortuitous biography, but by giving its typical features that are contained for all time in the Wisdom of the Mysteries. The Buddha legend is no more a biography in the ordinary sense than the Gospels are meant to be a biography of the Christ Jesus in the ordinary sense. In neither is the merely accidental given; both relate the course of life marked out for a world-redeemer. The pattern of the two accounts is to be found in the Mystery traditions, not in outer physical history. Jesus and Buddha are, to those who have recognized their divine nature, initiates in the most eminent sense. (Jesus is the initiate by virtue of the Christ Being dwelling in Him.) Hence their lives are lifted out of things transitory, and what is known about initiates applies to them. The fortuitous incidents in their lives are not narrated, but rather it is said of them:

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a God... And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us.” (St. John I, 1 and 14).

[ 6 ] But the life of Jesus contains more than does the life of Buddha. Buddha’s life ends with the transfiguration; the most momentous part of the life of Jesus begins after the transfiguration. In the language of initiates this means that Buddha reached the point at which divine light begins to shine in men. He faces mortal death. He becomes the light of the world: Jesus goes farther. He does not physically,die at the moment when the light of the world shines through him. At that moment he is a Buddha. But at that very moment he enters upon a stage which finds expression in a higher degree of initiation. He suffers and dies. What is earthly disappears. But the spiritual element, the light of the world, does not. His resurrection follows. He is revealed to his followers as Christ. Buddha, at the moment of his transfiguration, dissolves into the blissful life of the universal spirit. Christ Jesus once more calls the universal spirit into Present existence in human form. Such an event had formerly taken place at the higher stages of initiation in a symbolical sense. Those initiated in the spirit of the Osiris myth attained in their consciousness to such a resurrection as a symbolical experience. In the life of Jesus, this “great” initiation was added to the Buddha initiation, not as a symbolical experience, but as reality. Buddha demonstrated by his life that man is the Logos, and that he returns to the Logos, to the light, when his earthly part dies. In Jesus, the Logos itself became a person. In Him, the Word was made flesh.

[ 7 ] Therefore, what was enacted in the innermost recesses of the temples by the guardians of the ancient Mysteries has been apprehended through Christianity as a historical fact. The followers of Christ Jesus confessed their belief in Him, the initiate; in Him who was initiated in a manner unique in its magnitude. He proved to them that the world is divine. In the Christian community the wisdom of the Mysteries was indissolubly bound up with the personality of Christ Jesus. That which man previously had sought to attain through the Mysteries was now replaced by the belief that Christ had lived on earth, and that the faithful belonged to him.

Henceforward, part of what was formerly only to be gained through mystic methods could be replaced in the Christian community by the conviction that the Divine had been manifested in the Word present among them. Not that for which each individual soul underwent a long preparation was now alone decisive, but what those had heard and seen who were with Jesus, and what was handed down by them. “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which... our hands have handled, of the Word of Life... that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us.” Thus do we read in the first Epistle of St. John. And this immediate reality is to embrace all future generations in a living bond of union, and as a church is mystically to extend from race to race. It is in this sense that the words of St. Augustine are to be under " stood, “I should not believe the Gospels unless the authority of the Catholic Church induced me to do so.” Thus the Gospels do not contain within themselves testimony to their truth, but they are to be believed because they are founded on the personality of Jesus, and because the Church from that personality mysteriously draws the power to make the truth of the Gospels manifest.

The Mysteries handed down traditionally the means of arriving at truth; the Christian community propaBates truth itself. To the confidence in the mystical forces that spring up in the inmost being of man durIng initiation was to be added the confidence in the One, in the primordial Initiator.

The mystics sought to become divine, they wished to experience divinity. Jesus was divine, we must hold fast to Him, and then we shall become partakers of His divinity in the community founded by Him—this became Christian conviction. What was divine in Jesus became so for all His followers. “Lo, I am with you alway even unto the end of the world.” (St. Matthew, XXVIII 20). The one who was born in Bethlehem has an eternal character. The Christmas anthem rightly sings of the birth of Jesus as if it took place each Christmas “Christ is born to-day, the Saviour has come into the world to-day, today the angels are singing on earth.”

In the Christ-experience we should recognize a definite stage of initiation. When the mystic of pre-Christian times passed through this Christ-experience he was, through his initiation, in a state that enabled him to perceive something spiritually—in higher worlds—to which no fact in the world of sense corresponded. He experienced in the higher world what the Mystery of Golgotha comprises. Now, when the Christian mystic goes through this experience by initiation he at the same time beholds the historical event that took place on Golgotha, and he knows that in that event, enacted within the physical world, there is the same content that existed formerly only in the super sensible facts of the Mysteries. Thus there was poured out on the Christian community, through the Mystery of Golgotha, that which formerly had been poured out on the mystics within the temples. And initiation gives Christian mystics the possibility of discerning what is contained in the Mystery of Golgotha, whereas faith makes man an unconscious partaker of the mystical stream which flowed from the events depicted in the New Testament, and which has ever since pervaded the spiritual life of humanity.

• 1. (Cf. Lepsius, Das Totenbuch der alten Ägypter, (The Book Of the Dead of the Ancient Egyptians.) Berlin, 1842).

[ 1 ] Just at this time my outward life was altogether happy. I was frequently with my old friends. Few as were the opportunities I had to speak of the things I am here discussing, yet the spiritual and mental ties that bound me to these friends were none the less strong. How often must I think over again the conversations, sometimes unending, which occurred at that time in a well-known coffee house on Michaelerplatz in Vienna. I had cause to think of these especially during that period following the World War when old Austria went to pieces. For the causes of this crumbling to pieces were at that time already present everywhere. But no one was willing to recognize this. Everyone had thoughts that would be the means of a cure, always according to his own special national or cultural leanings. And if ideals which manifest themselves at times of the ebbing tide are stimulating, yet they are ideals born out of the decadence itself, out of the desire to prevent this-themselves being no less tragic. Such tragic ideals worked in the hearts of the best Viennese and Austrians.

[ 2 ] I frequently caused misunderstandings with these idealists when I expressed a conviction which had been borne in upon me through my absorption in the period of Goethe. I said that a culmination in Occidental cultural evolution had been reached during that period. This had not been continued. The period of the natural sciences, with its effects upon the lives of men and of peoples, denoted a decadence. For any further advance there was needed an entirely new attack from the side of the spirit. There could be no further progress into the spiritual by those roads which had previously been laid out, except after a previous turning back.

Goethe is a climax, but therefore not a point of departure; on the contrary, an end. He develops the results of an evolution which goes as far as himself and finds in him its most complete embodiment, but which cannot be further advanced without first resorting to far more primal springs of spiritual experience than exist in this evolution. In this mood I wrote the last part of my Goethe exposition.

[ 3 ] It was in this mood that I first became acquainted with Nietzsche's writings. Jenseits von Gut und Böse¹ was the first of his books that I read. I was fascinated by his way of viewing things and yet at the same time repelled. I found it hard to get a right attitude toward Nietzsche. I loved his style; I loved his keenness; but I did not love at all the way in which Nietzsche spoke of the most profound problems without immersing himself in these with fully conscious thought in spiritual experience. Only I then observed that he said many things with which I stood in the closest intimacy in my spiritual experience. And thus I felt myself close to his struggle and felt that I must find an expression for this proximity. Nietzsche seemed to me one of the most tragic figures of that time. And this tragedy, I believed, must be the effect of the spiritual attitude characterizing the natural-scientific age upon human souls of more than ordinary depth. I passed my last years in Vienna with such feelings as these.

[ 4 ] Before the close of the first phase of my life, I had the opportunity of visiting also Budapest and Siebenbürgen (Transylvania). The friend I have previously mentioned whose family belonged to Transylvania, who had remained bound to me with rare loyalty through all these years, had introduced me to a good many of the people from his district who were in Vienna. Thus it happened that, in addition to my other extensive social relationships, I had also this with persons from Transylvania. Among them were Herr and Frau Breitenstein, who became friends of mine at that time and who have remained such in the most heartfelt fashion. For a long time they have taken a leading part in the Anthroposophical Society in Vienna. This human relationship with “Siebenbürgers” led me to make a journey to Budapest. The capital of Hungary, in character so entirely unlike Vienna, made a deep impression upon me. One went there from Vienna through a region brilliant in the beauty of its scenery, its highly temperamental humanity, and the intensity of its musical interest. When one looked from the windows of the train, one had the impression that nature herself had become poetic in a special way, and that human beings, paying little heed to the poetic nature so familiar to them, plunged down within themselves in an often profoundly inward music of the heart. And, when one reached Budapest, there came to expression a world which may be viewed with the greatest interest from the point of view of the relationships to other European peoples, but which can from this point of view never be wholly understood. A dark undertone over which gleams a light playing amid colours. This character seemed to me as if it were forced together into visible unity when I stood before the Franz Drak [Ferenc Deák – e.Ed] monument. In this head of the maker of that Hungary which existed from the year 1867 to 1918 there lived a strong, proud will which laid hold with all its might, which forced itself through without cunning but with elemental mercilessness. I felt how true subjectively for every Hungarian was the proverb I had often heard: “Outside of Hungary there is no life; and, if there is a life, it is by no means such as this.”

[ 5 ] As a child I had seen on the western borders of Hungary how Germans were made to feel this strong, proud will; now I learned in the midst of Hungary how this will brings the Magyar people into an isolation from humanity which clothes them, as they rather naïvely think, in a certain glamour obvious to themselves which values much the showing of itself to the hidden eyes of nature but not to the open eyes of men.

[ 6 ] Half a year after this visit, my Transylvanian friends arranged for me to deliver a lecture at Hermannstadt. It was Christmas time. I traveled over the wide plains in the midst of which lies Arad. The melancholy poetry of Lenau sounded in my heart as I looked out over these plains where all is one expanse to which the eye can find no limit. I had to spend the night in a little border village between Hungary and Transylvania.

I sat in a little guest-room half the night. Besides myself there was only a group of card-players sitting round a table. In this group there were all the nationalities to be found at that time in Hungary and Transylvania. The men were playing with a vehemence which constantly broke loose at half-hour intervals, so that it took the form of soul-clouds which rose above the table, struggled together like demons, and wreathed the men about completely as if in the folds of serpents. What differences in vehement existence were there manifested by these different national types!

[ 7 ] I reached Hermannstadt on Christmas Day. Here I was introduced into “Siebenburger Saxondom.” This existed there in the midst of a Rumanian and Magyar environment. A noble folk which, in the midst of a decline that it could not perceive, desired to prove its gallantry. A Germanism which, like a memory of the transfer of its life centuries ago to the East, wished to show its loyalty to its origins, but which in this temper of soul showed a trait of alienation from the world manifesting itself as an elevated universal joy in life. I passed happy days among the German ministers of the Evangelical Church, among the teachers of the German schools, and among other German Siebenburgers. My heart warmed to these people who, in the concern for their folk life and in their duty to this, evolved a culture of the heart which spoke first of all likewise to the heart. [ 8 ] This vital warmth filled my soul as I sat in a sleigh, wrapped close in heavy furs, and travelled with these old and new friends through icy-cold and crackling snow to the Carpathians (the Transylvanian Alps). A dark, forested mountain country when one moves toward it from the distance; a wild, precipitous, often frightful mountain landscape when one is close at hand.

[ 9 ] The centre in all which I then experienced was my friend of many years. He was always thinking out something new whereby I might learn thoroughly Siebenburger Saxondom. He was still dividing his time between Vienna and Hermannstadt. At that time he owned a weekly paper at Hermannstadt founded for the purpose of fostering Siebenburger Saxondom. An undertaking it was which arose entirely out of idealism, utterly devoid of practical experience, but at which almost all representatives of Saxondom laboured together. After a few weeks it came to grief.

[ 10 ] Such experiences as this journey were brought me by destiny; and through them I was enabled to educate my perception for the outer world, a thing which had not been easy for me, whereas in the element of the spiritual I lived as in something self-evident.

[ 11 ] It was with sad memories that I made the journey back to Vienna. There fell into my hands just then a book of whose “spiritual richness” men of all sorts were speaking: Rembrandt als Erzieher.² In conversations about this book, which were then going on wherever one went, one could hear about the coming of an entirely new spirit. I was forced to become aware, by reason of this very phenomenon, of the great loneliness in which I stood with my temper of mind amid the spiritual life of that period.

[ 12 ] In regard to a book which was prized in the highest degree by all the world my own feeling was as if someone had sat for several months at a table in one of the better hotels and listened to what the “outstanding” personalities in the genealogical tables said by way of “brilliant” remarks, and had then written these down in the form of aphorisms. After this continuous “preliminary work” he could have thrown his slips of paper with these remarks into a vessel, shaken them thoroughly together, and then taken them out again After drawing out the slips, he could have made a series of these and so produced a book. Of course, this criticism is exaggerated. But my inner vital mood forced me into such revulsion from that which the “spirit of the times” then praised as a work of the highest merit. I considered Rembrandt as Teacher a book which dealt wholly with the surface of thoughts that have to do with the realm of the spiritual, and which did not harmonize in a single sentence with the real depths of the human soul. It grieved me to know that my contemporaries considered such a book as coming from a profound personality, whereas I was forced to believe that such dealers in the small change of thought moving in the shallows of the spirit would drive all that is deeply human out of man's soul.

[ 13 ] When I was fourteen years old I had to begin tutoring; for fifteen years, up to the beginning of the second phase of my life, that spent at Weimar, my destiny kept me engaged in this work. The unfolding of the minds of many persons, both in childhood and in youth, was in this way bound up with my own evolution. Through this means I was able to observe how different were the ways in which the two sexes grow into life. For, along with the giving of instruction to boys and young men, it fell to my lot to teach also a number of young girls. Indeed, for a long time the mother of the boy whose instruction I had taken over because of his pathological condition was a pupil of mine in geometry; and at another time I taught this lady and her sister aesthetics.

[ 14 ] In the family of these children I found for a number of years a sort of home, from which I went out to other families as tutor or instructor. Through the intimate friendship between the mother of the children and myself, it came about that I shared fully in the joys and sorrows of this family. In this woman I perceived a uniquely beautiful human soul. She was wholly devoted to the development of her four boys according to their destiny. In her one could study mother love in its larger manifestation. To co-operate with her in problems of education formed a beautiful content of life. For the musical part of the artistic she possessed both talent and enthusiasm. At times she took charge of the musical practice of her boys, as long as they were still young. She discussed intelligently with me the most varied life problems, sharing in everything with the deepest interest. She gave the greatest attention to my scientific and other tasks. There was a time when I had the greatest need to discuss with her everything which intimately concerned me. When I spoke of my spiritual experiences, she listened in a peculiar way. To her intelligence the thing was entirely congenial, but it maintained a certain marked reserve; yet her mind absorbed everything. At the same time she maintained in reference to man's being a certain naturalistic view. She believed the moral temper to be entirely bound up with the health or sickness of the bodily constitution. I mean to say that she thought instinctively about man in a medical fashion, whereby her thinking tended to be somewhat naturalistic. To discuss things in this way with her was in the highest degree stimulating. Besides, her attitude toward all outer life was that of a woman who attended with the strongest sense of duty to everything which fell to her lot, but who looked upon most inner things as not belonging to her sphere. She looked upon her fate in many aspects as something burdensome. But still she made no claims upon life; she accepted this as it took form so far as it did not concern her sons. In relation to these she felt every experience with the deepest emotion of her soul.

[ 15 ] All this I shared vitally – the soul-life of a woman, her beautiful devotion to her sons, the life of the family within a wide circle of kinsmen and acquaintances. But for this reason things did not move without difficulty. The family was Jewish. In their views they were quite free from any sectarian or racial narrowness, but the head of the family, to whom I was deeply attached, felt a certain sensitiveness to any expression by a Gentile in regard to the Jews. The flame of anti-Semitism which had sprung up at that time had caused this feeling.

[ 16 ] Now, I took a keen interest in the struggle which the Germans in Austria were then carrying on in behalf of their national existence. I was also led to occupy myself with the historical and the social position of the Jews. Especially earnest did this activity of mine become after the appearance of Hamerling's Homunculus. This eminent German poet was considered by a great part of the journalists as an anti-Semite on account of this work; indeed, he was claimed by the German national anti-Semites as one of their own. This disturbed me very little; but I wrote a paper on the Homunculus in which, as I thought, I expressed myself quite objectively in regard to the Jews. The man in whose home I lived, and who was my friend, took this to be a special form of anti-Semitism. Not in the least did his friendly feeling for me suffer on that account, but he was affected with a profound distress. When he had read the paper, he faced me, his heart torn by innermost sorrow, and said to me: “What you wrote in this in regard to the Jews cannot be explained in a friendly sense; but this is not what hurts me, but the fact that you could have had the experiences in regard to us which induced you to write thus only through your close relationship with us and our friends.” He was mistaken: for I had formed my opinions altogether from a spiritual and historic survey; nothing personal had entered into my judgment. He could not see the thing in this way. His reply to my explanations was: “No, the man who teaches my children is, after this paper, no ‘friend of the Jews.’” He could not be induced to change. Not for a moment did he think that my relation ship to the family ought to be altered. This he looked upon as something necessary. Still less could I make this matter the occasion for a change; for I looked upon the teaching of his sons as a task which destiny had brought to me. But neither of us could do otherwise than think that a tragic thread had been woven into this relationship. [ 17 ] To all this was added the fact that many of my friends had taken on from their national struggle a tinge of anti-Semitism in their view of the Jews. They did not view sympathetically my holding a post in a Jewish family; and the head of this family saw in my friendly mingling with such persons only a confirmation of the impression which he had received from my paper.

[ 18 ] To the family circle in which I so intimately shared belonged the composer of Das Goldene Kreuz, Ignatius Brüll. A sensitive person he was, of whom I was extraordinarily fond. Ignatius Brüll was something of an alien to the world, buried in himself. His interests were not exclusively musical; they were directed toward many aspects of the spiritual life. These interests he could enter into only as a “darling of destiny” against the background of a family circle which never permitted him to be disturbed by attention to everyday affairs but permitted his creative work to grow out of a certain prosperity. And thus he did not grow in life but only in music. To what degree his musical creations were or were not meritorious is not the question just here. But it was stimulating in the most beautiful sense to meet the man in the street and see him awaken out of his world of tones when one addressed him. Generally he did not have his waistcoat buttons in the right button-holes. His eye spoke in a mild thoughtfulness; his walk was not fast but very expressive. One could talk with him about many things; for these he had a sensitive understanding; but one saw how the content of the conversation slipped, as it were, for him into the sphere of music.

[ 19 ] In the family in which I thus lived I became acquainted also with the distinguished physician, Dr. Breuer, who was associated with Dr. Freud at the birth of psycho-analysis. Only in the beginning, however, did he share in this sort of view, and he was not in agreement with Freud in its later development. Dr. Breuer was to me a very attractive personality. I admired the way in which he was related to his medical profession. Besides, he was a man of many interests in other fields. He spoke of Shakespeare in such a way as to stimulate one very strongly. It was interesting also to hear him in his purely medical way of thinking speak of Ibsen or even of Tolstoi's Kreuzer Sonata. When he spoke with the friend I have here described, the mother of the children whom I had to teach, I was often present and deeply interested. Psycho-analysis was not yet born; but the problems which looked toward this goal were already there. The phenomena of hypnotism had given a special colouring to medical thought. My friend had been a friend of Dr. Breuer from her youth. There I faced a fact which gave me much food for thought. This woman thought in a certain direction more medically than the distinguished physician. They were once discussing a morphine addict. Dr. Breuer was treating him. The woman once said to me: “Think what Breuer has done! He has taken the promise of the morphine addict on his word of honour that he will take no more morphine. He expected to attain something by this, and he was deluded, since the patient did not keep his promise. He even said: ‘How can I treat a man who does not keep his promise?’ Would one have believed,” she said, “that so distinguished a physician could be so naïve? How can one try to cure ‘by a promise’ something so deeply rooted ‘in a man's nature’?” The woman may not, however, have been entirely right; the opinion of the physician regarding the therapy of suggestion may have entered then into his attempt at a cure; but no one can deny that my friend's statement indicated the extraordinary energy with which she spoke in a noteworthy fashion out of the spirit which lived in the Viennese school of medicine up to the time when this new school blossomed forth.

[ 20 ] This woman was in her own way a significant person; and she is a significant phenomenon in my life. She has long been dead; among the things which made it hard for me to leave Vienna was this also, that I had to part from her.

[ 21 ] When I reflect in retrospect upon the content of the first phase of my life, while I seek to characterize it as if from without, the feeling forces itself upon me that destiny so led me that I was not fettered by any external “calling” during my first thirty years. I entered the Goethe and Schiller Institute in Weimar also, not to take a life position, but as a free collaborator in the edition of Goethe which would be published by the Institute under a commission from the Grand-duchess Sophie. In the report which the Director of the Institute published in the twelfth volume of the Goethe Year Book occurs this statement: “The permanent workers have associated with themselves since 1890 Rudolf Steiner from Vienna. To him has been assigned the general field of ‘morphology’ (with the exception of the osteological part): five or probably six volumes of the ‘second division,’ to which important material is added from the manuscript, remains.”

• 1. Beyond Good and Evil.
• 2. Rembrandt as Teacher.

From the time of the Foundation Meeting of the Anthroposophical Society (Dornach, Christmas to New Year, 1923–24) until his death shortly before Easter, 1925, Rudolf Steiner wrote a letter week by week, addressed to the members of the Society. The letters were printed in the members' supplement to the Goetheanum Weekly and in the English edition of it, Anthroposophical Movement. They have since been republished in book form, both in the original and in translation. In English they have long been out of print.

The present publication represents the second of two volumes. The earlier letters (which it is hoped soon to republish as a first volume) speak of the character and aims of the Anthroposophical Society and of the social tasks arising in this spiritual movement. They deal with the problems met with in the common study of Spiritual Science and in presenting it to the world at large, relating it to the prevailing science and civilization of the time. The ones collected in this second volume, with the exception of the first two (issued in August, 1924, while he was in England) were written by Rudolf Steiner from his sick-bed during his final illness. During these last six months of his life, the letters—written always in the very early hours of the morning—came with unfailing regularity; the last of them was printed two weeks after his death. These letter form a continuous series, to which the appropriate title “The Michael Mystery” has since been given. As such, they constitute an invaluable addition to the great teacher's fundamental works on Spiritual Science.

The present volume is a revised edition of the translation made by the late Mrs. E. Bowen-Wedgwood, published in book-form in 1930 and again in 1933. The task of translating the written works of Rudolf Steiner is one of peculiar difficulty. In his own language he often departed from conventional forms, so as to adapt the style and wording to the difficult task of conveying facts of the spiritual world through the medium of earthly language. The forms of expression which he developed towards the end of his life present even greater problems of translation than his earlier writings, such for example as Theosophy or the Outline of Occult Science.

Fully aware of the difficulty of the task and bringing to it a thorough knowledge of the language and literature of both countries, Mrs. Bowen-Wedgwood made a deliberate effort to widen the range of expression, even at the cost of bold departures from the conventional English of the present day. She herself writes of it in her original foreword: “In trying to reproduce such contents in an English form, the translator would ask the reader's patience where the language may somewhat deviate from past tradition or present practice … In the West, it is time to make determined endeavours towards evolving forms of the mother-tongue that can receive what has now been given … They can be, at present, but groping first endeavours, may be uncouth and inhabitual. But the speech of any race of men is not a thing that can be standardised and fixed; it grows with their spiritual growth, and is at all times a measure of it. The English language…has still to find, through the souls of its speakers, those modulations which shall carry the spiritual substance that lives in the words of Rudolf Steiner.”

From conversations I myself was privileged to have with Rudolf Steiner when I interpreted his lectures by word of mouth, I know how anxious he was that we should not allow our language to become stereotyped, or resist the kind of changes which a new content in spiritual life will tend to bring about. You put a stop to all spiritual progress, he said to me on one occasion, if you insist that your mother-tongue must remain in the precise form to which you are now accustomed. He gave examples to show how rapidly—in German too—a new creative element in spiritual life will bring in quite new forms of expression, which soon become so familiar that it is difficult to believe they were not always there.

For this revised edition I have however made some modifications so as to ease the reader's way. Notably the anthroposophical technical terms, for some of which Mrs. Bowen-Wedgwood used new forms of her own, have been restored to the accustomed English versions. Concerning technical terms, the following notes may be of help. For the three soul-members, these are the renderings approved (or, in the last two instances, actually suggested) by Rudolf Steiner:

• Empfindungs-Seele: Sentient Soul

• Verstandes-oder Gemüts-Seele: Intellectual or Mind-Soul

• Bewusstseins-Seele: Spiritual Soul

In the existing English editions of his works, the third of these—Bewusstseins-Seele—has often been rendered more literally, ‘Consciousness-Soul.’ This was the natural thing to do before Dr. Steiner—at Ilkley in 1923—asked that it be rendered ‘Spiritual Soul.’ Competent students are of opinion that ‘Consciousness-soul’ should still be retained as an alternative. This should be borne in mind as regards the present volume too. Dr. Steiner, in writing of the ‘Age of the Spiritual Soul’ (the fifth post-Atlantean period, beginning in the fifteenth century A.D.) often shortens the expression Bewusstseinsseelen-Zeitalter to Bewusstseins-Zeitalter, and in the context this is related to the literal meaning of Bewusstsein, referring to the awakened human consciousness of modern time. In such instances we have translated literally, ‘The Age of Consciousness;’ it should be remembered that this is here synonymous with ‘the Age of the Spiritual Soul.’

World is here used as the equivalent of the cognate German Welt, meaning the or a Universe. Used without further qualification, the English word is now so commonly applied to the Earth-planet alone that many people have forgotten its wider meaning, which the Oxford Dictionary describes as “the system of created things; ‘heaven and earth;’ the cosmos.” It is undoubtedly better to retain this more universal meaning among others, and thus to use the cognate English word where Dr. Steiner speaks of Welt, or in the plural, Welten.

The word Vorstellung and the kindred verb and verbal noun Vorstellen present a special problem. The late Professor Hoernlé's rendering of Vorstellung as ‘idea’ in the first edition of ‘The Philosophy of Freedom’ (1916) has been adversely criticized and has since been replaced by ‘representation.’ Vorstellung is however a word in common use, and the colloquial present-day use of the word ‘idea’ in English comes very near its meaning. Vorstellen may then be rendered ‘ideation;’ it is the activity of forming mental images in the every-day process of thought. Mrs. Bowen-Wedgwood, in her translations of this and other works, has used diverse terms, including ‘mental presentation’ and ‘mental conception’ (conception as distinct from concept, which is the accepted rendering of Begriff). In the present volume, the terms: mental conception, mental picturing, and the forming of mental conceptions and mental images, have been used. (See especially Letters XXII, XXIII and XXVI.)

The ‘Leading thoughts’ in which the several Letters are summed up have also been published separately along with the many earlier Leading Thoughts containing the elements of Spiritual Science, most of which were given without explanatory Letters. In the existing English edition, entitled Anthroposophical Leading Thoughts (London, 1927) the translation is by the present writer. (No. XXXV here corresponds to No. III in the present volume, and so on to the end: No. LXI to No. XXIX.) So far as these brief summaries are concerned, an independent translation is thus available, and it may sometimes be helpful to compare the two.

If we follow the entire development of man, we will remember that initially we are dealing with Pitris, who come from the lunar epoch, because the Pitris are the actual people who came over in the seed and form the disposition to the earth. They have already shed the three realms, and we are dealing with moon Pitris.

That is the first factor. The second is where the Pitri are to incarnate, which comes from the earth itself, because the lunar forms are gone. There is a second current that must connect with the first. And the third is the one that came during the Lemurian epoch as manasic fertilization.

The soul comes from the moon, the body from the earth, it is formed from the earth. And the spirit comes from above as a divine impact. Thus the three limbs are composed.

These three currents are the representatives of three entities:

1. Human entity
2. Superhuman entity
3. Subhuman entity. We call the superhuman “divine entities”; the mystic also calls them “heavenly gods”. The second current from which the souls come, we call “star gods” or “planetary or sidereal gods”.

[gap in transcript]

Three groups, from which the body is built, we call elemental spirits. Thus we may say that man is built according to his body from elemental, underground spirits. They have gradually formed the bodies of minerals, plants, animals and humans to the point where he is glowing from the planetary [gap in the transcript] spirit. Only at the end of his development will he be spirit or logos.

We must also understand other characteristic features. We can characterize the elemental beings by saying that they have will, mind and thought in a single center. If we study all the elemental spirits that create in our evolution and ask, “What do you want?” there is no sense in it. For the common spirit has the will, the elemental spirit is the doer. Likewise, it has a common consciousness - you cannot ask, “What do you feel?” Like the hand in humans. Therefore, the activity of the elemental spirits appears in the form of necessary natural laws. They appear to be without feeling and will as necessities because consciousness is at the center of the whole macrocosm.

Now we come to the sidereal entities. When they have reached the highest level, they have their feelings for themselves and their thoughts for themselves, but not yet their will for themselves. When man has arrived at the end of the earth's development as a planetary Logos, he will be able to think and feel everything, but not to will. That will only come when he has spiritualized the next three planets. Then we are all-feeling and all-willing beings, but not yet all-powerful beings. However, the human being is now gradually acquiring will. The will element is what gradually emerges and has been developing freedom since the middle of the Lemurian period. An elemental being is not free, neither in relation to [gap in the transcript] plan. The Logos is free in relation to his thoughts when he has reached the highest point, and in relation to feeling; and a divine spirit being is free in relation to thought, feeling and will. This also explains why Christian esotericism does not ascribe free will to man, only to man to a limited extent. Angels carry out the will of God, are messengers. They see that thought and feeling are in balance in the mid [gap in transcript] sidereal beings. The two are not yet mastered by the will, therefore still in conflict;

They will bring them into full harmony through the will on the next planet. So that these planetary spirits in particular, which enter our earth, maintain balance in thought and feeling, thus still fluctuating back and forth, are not yet stable – hence Kama-Manas.

The third degree of divine beings has stable equilibrium through the will that holds them in balance. If you follow this, you will say to yourself: At the beginning of the first planet, we only see elementary beings at work, because the Pitris are still children. Then, in the middle of planetary development, the influence of the sidereal beings begins and continues, and from the middle to the end, the influence of the divine beings sets in.

From the beginning, therefore, we have only one center consciousness for the planetary cosmos; then a sidereal consciousness begins to develop, and then a heavenly one. In the beginning one is conscious, and at the end all partake of the consciousness of the one; in the beginning unity consciousness, in the end multiplicity consciousness. Now, we call the end product of such a being, endowed with consciousness, “Atm”. And the unity consciousness in the beginning we call “Ishwar”, so that we have to imagine the whole evolution as a transition from the unity consciousness, the Ishwara, to the unity consciousness of the <“Atwar”. He keeps giving until symphony is achieved.

If you now imagine the development, you have to say to yourself: We are dealing with an undivided Ishwara consciousness at the beginning, which has divided somewhere until the dull ego consciousnesses emerge. This point is esoterically and astrologically referred to as Libra. So you can say: The esoteric meaning of the statue of Libra is the emergence of Atma from Ishwara.

And now an important moment in evolution occurs: that the being from which the I emerged is a duality; for it is, after all, a macrocosmic being. The microcosm is the Atma embryo and the macrocosm is what acts from the outside as Ishwara consciousness. So, after the constellation of Libra, where they then diverge, you have the duality: the virginal soul, Virgo, and what comes in from outside, the powerful. This can also be called will, Leo. And now we have already reached the point where Leo and Virgo, which previously only asserted themselves in the natural kingdoms, gradually come together in man, the hermaphroditic human being, Gemini. Of course, between Leo and Virgo and Gemini, the reversal must take place; what was on the outside must come inside, that is what Cancer means. We have now assessed it in the hermaphroditic human being, the duality that is now emerging on the other side. What used to be higher nature becomes lower nature: Taurus. And now the ascent begins again, it goes up to Aries. What was lower nature becomes the representative of justice - the Jason saga.

The next thing is that justice does not remain external, but takes hold of the inner being: Kama, the water. We have the constellation of Pisces. Present moment. The theosophical movement [gap in the transcript]

Then it continues. Future: Aquarius, Sagittarius, Scorpio, and then again Libra.

New cycle from God to man. That which takes place between Libra and Aries – Virgo, Leo, Cancer, Gemini, Taurus, Pisces – is the openly apparent human development of our Earth.

On the other hand, we have the hidden development in the deity. It lies between Libra and Pisces. So everything that lies on the other side, externally visible development, can be seen through G/gap in the transcript]. Everything else lies on the outer side when developing internally - night, southern half. The one, the visible, is in a comprehensive sense the content of science. The other half is the content of the mysteries. Of course, only the full science illuminates the whole. Therefore, the theosophical development is the unveiling of the other side, the actual night that becomes day for those who enter into it. Therefore, at Christmas, the sun rises in Virgo and rises higher and higher; at Easter, there is the rebirth from Taurus man to Aries ram; and then it goes through Pisces to the full height of the sun.

and the new participants: Carl Unger and the two Waldorf teachers Paul Baumann and Dr. Herbert Hahn. The following are proposed as the new board: Emil Leinhas, Dr. Hahn, Paul Baumann, Dr. Kolisko, who replaces Ernst Uehli, who has resigned from the central board.

The meeting begins ¹ with a proposal concerning the future composition of the Central Executive Committee, from which Mr. Uehli has withdrawn. The Committee of Seven has been expanded to include three members: Dr. Unger, Baumann and Dr. Hahn were invited to the meeting. Dr. Kolisko is the spokesman; he is provisionally taking over the place of Mr. Uehli on the Central Board. It is said that it is necessary to cultivate more concrete relationships with young people and that Dr. Unger cannot find his way to the young; their way does not connect with his.

In response to the proposals and resolutions put forward by the four gentlemen to place anthroposophy more intensively at the center of their work, Dr. Steiner remarked that this was the only way to deal with the opposition in the youth circles. Even if the youth, who have been tendentiously influenced in this direction, find Dr. Unger's lectures too dry, this should not be a reason for him to become inactive; the work of Dr. Unger is also urgently needed for the branch.

The gentlemen also discuss the fact that the members and branches in the periphery should be given information about the burning issues of society. The representatives of the branches would be asked to come to important meetings in Stuttgart in the near future. Communication with the religious renewal movement should be sought. A new attitude towards the opposition is recognized as necessary.

Dr. Stein: We want to work together. I believe that Dr. Unger can also work with us.

Dr. Unger: The most pressing tasks are summarized in these proposals. What makes you think that there will be trust?

Dr. Steiner: I would like to raise a question regarding the proposals that have been made. It does not matter that a number of personalities now have the things that have been formulated here in their heads and are expressing them; because these four walls here are listening very silently! At first, it may be thought that things will go extremely well; but one must start by wanting to understand whether this is a reality. Lack of trust has been much discussed. How would you imagine summoning the thirty-strong circle of Stuttgart-based personalities on Monday to present the finished proposals? Can you imagine what the assembly would make of these things? Can you imagine nothing but agreement? What about the first meeting of the committee of seven? —You can't say that Mr. Uehli, for example, was there last night. He wasn't really there. He came to make his positions available. I didn't get the impression that Mr. Uehli brought the committee of seven to me either. I didn't get that impression. I did have the impression that Mr. Uehli was only dragged along. Really, I did not have the impression that Mr. Uehli brought this circle to me. I could not have had that belief.

First, Mrs. Marie Steiner speaks. Then several people comment on the situation as they see it.

Dr. Steiner: This representation would be a small opiate. If we begin in this way, without clarity, we are basing it on something that is not true. How could one have come to the conclusion that Mr. Uehli brought about this committee of seven? — There has been so much talk of active energy that has now been awakened by becoming aware of what happened during the first sessions. Not everyone present was aware of this. Mr. Uehli was not really there; nor can it be said that Mr. Uehli was present when the results of the first evening were discussed.

Several people describe their impressions and resolutions.

Dr. Steiner: If something is to happen now, it is important that it be built on a living foundation, as it were. Those who are rousing themselves must say: What is necessary for society as a whole has not happened so far, and we must do it now. Otherwise it is not enough; they must be imbued with the realization that things cannot go on like this. Even in a circular letter it must be said: It cannot go on like this. Everything must be justified and substantiated. It must be quite clear: Do we want to keep the old leadership, or do we want something new?

Take the example of “Religious Renewal” that you brought up on the agenda. This “Religious Renewal” is an event. One day, Dr. Rittelmeyer and Emil Bock appeared and launched this thing. It started from the various meetings that were held with prominent figures in the religious renewal movement. The leading personalities drew their conclusions from all these meetings. Mr. Uehli was present at all these meetings. It was not Mr. Leinhas who was called upon, but precisely Mr. Uehli. He knows exactly what it is all about. The other course participants had begun their action, but the member of the Central Board had sat down on the curule seat! ¹From this emerged the porridge that you now have to boil down.

Another lively debate ensues. Dr. Steiner concludes it with the following words:

Dr. Steiner: So we would meet on Monday with the thirties group and with people you want to involve as well. Right, the thirties group is the first periphery for now. The point now is to determine who else should be there.

Names are mentioned and the meeting is closed.

• 1. In Marie Steiner's edition - based on the protocol of Karl Schubert - marked “Shortly after January 8, 1923”. The exact date could only be determined now.
• 1. Uehli was not only a member of the Central Board, but also a teacher of religion for the free religious education of the Waldorf School. Because of these two functions, he had been invited to the lecture courses for the religious renewal movement. Rudolf Steiner had expected it to be a matter of course that the Society would be informed by the Central Board or by Uehli respectively. Since this did not happen, Rudolf Steiner provided this information himself in his two lectures given immediately before the fire at the Goetheanum (December 30 and 31, 1922). After the fire, the following message from the Central Board appeared in the “Mitteilungen” (no. 2, January 1923), which it had published:
  "The appearance of the movement for religious renewal has caused difficulties and misunderstandings in many circles of the Anthroposophical Society. Shortly before the beginning of their public work, the three members of the Central Council of the Anthroposophical Society [Dr. Carl Unger, Emil Leinhas, Ernst Uehli] had a conversation in Dornach with the four leading personalities of the religious renewal movement [Friedrich Rittelmeyer, Emil Bock, Werner Johannes Klein, Gertrud Spörri] about the two movements working together. In the light of this discussion, the Central Council had decided to bring a brief account of the historical development and tasks of the religious renewal movement to the attention of the members at this point. This account was to be sent out immediately after the conclusion of the events taking place in Dornach over Christmas and New Year. The devastating event of the destruction of the Goetheanum by a maliciously set fire has meanwhile penetrated into all hearts as a terrible pain. The last lectures Dr. Steiner gave at the Goetheanum were on the tasks of the Anthroposophical Society and Movement. On December 30, 1922, the day before the catastrophe, Dr. Steiner spoke about the religious renewal movement. Instead of our presentation, which was already prepared, we will present a free rendering of this lecture.”

The meeting was opened by the chairman, Dr. Emil Grosheintz, with the following address:

Dear friends.

On behalf of ¹ the board of the Association of the Goetheanum, the School of Spiritual Science, I warmly welcome you to our tenth ordinary General Assembly today. We open this General Assembly in a spirit of mourning, because the last day of the year, which would have been reported here today, robbed us of the Goetheanum, the fruit of ten years of work. The first Goetheanum is no more. It is not only we who have lost it, but all of humanity, because it belonged to humanity. We did not build it for ourselves, but for humanity yearning for spiritual truth. The Goetheanum was a place for cultivating the new spiritual knowledge that Rudolf Steiner gave to the world through Anthroposophy, a place of truth. The Goetheanum was a unique and irreplaceable work of art. In the harmony of the spatial design and the harmony of forms and colors, a new realm of beauty revealed itself to the wondering soul. The Goetheanum was an act of universal humanity. People from many different nations built it at a time when the peoples of the world brought misery, death and bondage to each other. It was a work of human love in a world of hatred between nations.

The Goetheanum was a work of Rudolf Steiner. The Goetheanum now belongs to history.

The foundation stone of the Goetheanum was laid on September 20, 1913. Seven years later, in September 1920, the first event took place in it, the first anthroposophical university course.

It was introduced by a simple provisional opening. In his opening speech, Dr. Steiner pointed the way for the School of Spiritual Science by speaking of the synthesis of science and art and religion, how it once existed and how it is to be brought about again through spiritual science.

In addition to numerous events and courses that took place in the adjoining buildings, and many beautiful eurythmy performances, the following took place at the Goetheanum: a second college course; a summer course for English artists in 1921; a pedagogical course in the winter of 1921; the so-called French Week in the summer of 1922; and a science course at Christmas 1922, during which the great misfortune of the fire occurred.

The course and the events that were taking place at the time were not interrupted. The spiritual work continued. This made a certain impression on some people, including the local population. The day after the fire, a respected citizen of Dornach expressed his condolences for the loss of the Goetheanum and said: “No matter what one thinks of the Anthroposophical Society, the hard work and willingness to make sacrifices that the Goetheanum stands for must inspire admiration. But what I admire most,“ he said, ‘is that you have not interrupted your activities despite your great misfortune. And there,’ he said, ‘I had to think of Geibel's verses, which Felix Dahn put forward as a motto in his novel ’A Struggle for Rome'.” And he quoted these verses to me. They refer to those who were defeated in this struggle for Rome. They read: “If there is anything mightier than fate, it is the courage to bear it unwaveringly.”

But, my dear friends, we need more than this passive courage to bear a blow of fate. We must develop an active courage. The destruction of the Goetheanum is a call to action.

Just as the Anthroposophical Society has already done, the Association of the Goetheanum today also expresses its will to build a new Goetheanum and approaches Dr. Steiner with the request to give us and the world a new Goetheanum and to let us participate.

If this is your will, I ask you to rise from your seats.

(All those present rise from their seats.

And now I turn to all those in our movement and ask them to join the Goetheanum Association as members. The cause of our association is your cause. Those who are members of the Goetheanum Association are helping to build it.

On December 31, 1922, the association had 1059 members, compared to 1015 in the previous year. The increase in 1922 is 44 members. Of these 1059 members, 496 are extraordinary and 563 contributing members. Of these, 694 belong to Central Europe, which is weak in currency, and only 365 to Switzerland and the other countries.

Our first task will be to create the necessary building fund, which we are making available to Dr. Steiner. The sum paid to us by the insurance company, which amounts to three million one hundred and eighty-three thousand francs, is not enough for this purpose. Rather, as Dr. Steiner has already informed us, this sum will amount to about half of what is likely to be needed as a total sum for the completion of the work. We have gained experience and times have changed since the first Goetheanum was built. And so the money should be there before construction begins; at least a percentage of it should be there before construction begins.

The initiatives taken so far have also brought in some money, perhaps around 150,000 francs.

Now, at the suggestion of our English friends, an international assembly of delegates will meet here on July 22 and discuss the further financing of the construction. But without the significant efforts of each individual in our movement, the matter will not go forward.

My dear friends! To report to you on the construction work of the past year now that the building is no longer standing would be just as painful as it is fruitless. We will therefore refrain from doing so this year. Our gaze is fixed on the future, our will unswervingly forward.

Minutes of the last general assembly are available. I ask whether

you would like to have them read. If not, I would like to ask our business manager to present the cash report. Mr. Binder will briefly summarize the main expenditures and revenues in the past fiscal year and present the balance sheet that results after deducting the fire damage.

In 1922, the following expenses were incurred:

Construction costs for the Goetheanum, for the expansion of the paths, for loan and mortgage interest, exchange rate losses, depreciation Fr. 371,197.28
General expenses for security, lighting, heating of the building, including maintenance costs. Fr. 116,414.94
= Fr. 487,612.22

On the other hand, the following was received:

Donations......................................Fr. 239,929.34
Loans..............................................Fr. 35,000.--
Membership fees....................................Fr. 24,459.60
Interest income etc.................................Fr. 5,863.35
............................................... = Fr. 305,252.29

From bank reserves, Fr. 182,59,93

The Goetheanum was insured before the fire for...Fr. 5,657,101.39
The fire insurance sum is...........................Fr. 3,500,000.--
so that without taking into account the non-material
values, a fire loss of..............................Fr. 2,157,101.39

Of the fire insurance sum, CHF 3,183,000 is to be paid out, while the remainder of CHF 317,000 is considered to be the estimated value of the concrete base that is still standing.

After taking this depreciation into account, the following

balance sheet as of January 1, 1923:

Assets

Real estate......................Fr. 265,411.47
Goetheanum concrete base............Fr. 317,000.--
Goetheanum adjoining buildings......Fr. 275,469.92
Houses and properties...............Fr. 334,731.67
............................... = Fr. 1,192,613.06
Inventories and materials...........Fr. 145 754.--
Accounts receivable.................Fr. 128,739.85
Banks:
a) Current account...................Fr. 24,598.80
b) Sum insured....................Fr. 3,183,000.--
Cash..................................Fr. 4,656.70
............................... = Fr. 4,679,362.41

Liabilities

Foundation capital.............Fr. 5,471,952.50
(from fire damage)................Fr. 2,157,101.39
............................... = Fr. 3,314,851.11
Loans.............................Fr. 1,022,047.83
Liabilities..........................Fr. 78,463.47
Mortgages...........................Fr. 264 000.--
............................... = Fr. 4,679,362.41

The auditors confirmed that the books were properly kept and requested discharge of the accounts, which was then given by the meeting.

The auditors were reelected for the following year. There being no further business, Dr. Steiner spoke on the following subject: [See p. 146]

• 1. Protocol probably by Helene Finckh. The stenogram is not available.