O Destino de Indivíduos e Nações. 5. A Natureza do Impulso Crístico e o Espírito Micaélico que o serve
São vários os ciclos de palestras onde Rudolf Steiner trata dos Mistérios do Mal e como lidamos com este Mistério em nossa Era de Evolução. Lidar, nestas diferentes palestras envolve diferentes termos. Então enquanto neste ciclo aqui mencionado Rudolf Steiner se refere a resistir/confrontar/lidar, em outros ciclos ele se refere a transformar, redimir.
O que sempre devemos ter em mente ao ler Rudolf Steiner é
que ele tem muitas formas para abordar os assuntos e que ao desconhecermos a
Metodologia de Steiner e Goethe, nossa compreensão fica prejudicada, pois usamos o intelecto não espiritualizado/cristianizado (de acordo com a época atual na qual vivemos).
Isto, para que as coisas façam sentido.
Sonia von Homrich
Rudolf Steiner
Não resistimos ao Ahriman através da rejeição à modernidade, mas sim pela busca da inteligência com alma.
Como resistir a esse elemento de Ahriman em nossa época, da mesma forma que resistimos ao elemento de Lúcifer na época de Joana d'Arc?
Resistimos ao elemento de Ahriman trilhando exatamente o caminho que tem sido tão enfaticamente apontado repetidas vezes em nossa corrente de Ciência Espiritual (Ciência Espiritual Cristã/ Cristologia de Rudolf Steiner)— o caminho para a espiritualização da cultura humana, da capacidade do homem de formar ideias e conceitos. É por isso que se enfatiza constantemente que existe um caminho pelo qual tudo o que a ciência espiritual pode nos oferecer, mesmo que inicialmente nos seja presentado em grande parte pelo mundo espiritual, só pode ser verdadeiramente, plenamente e completamente apreendido pelo intelecto, razão pela qual o homem/ser humano foi agraciado desde o século XVI até os dias de hoje (com o intelecto). E ao dizemos que não entendemos, é somente porque damos ouvidos aos preconceitos vigentes no materialismo de nossa época. Devemos parar de dar ouvidos à voz do materialismo contemporâneo, uma voz que fala ora em voz alta, ora em sussurros quase inaudíveis. Em vez disso, devemos concentrar firmemente nossa mente nos poderes de compreensão/ entendimento que temos. Então, as coisas que a ciência espiritual produz para nós um dia parecerão ser perfeitamente compreensíveis, como algo que pode ser entendido tanto quanto qualquer outro evento do mundo exterior.
Nós geramos o grande fortalecimento que necessitamos para
oferecer resistência às forças ahrimânicas ao nos aproximarmos do espírito não meramente
através das mais íntimas capacidades da revelação e da fé, como no caso de
Joana d'Arc, mas também tentando concentrar os nossos poderes de compreensão/
entendimento mais intensamente, no que a ciência espiritual tem a nos oferecer.
Se fizermos isso, a hora, o momento, chegará no qual teremos que dizer a nós mesmos: aquilo que nos
chega a partir da Ciência Espiritual, é a única coisa racional que, ao mesmo
tempo, torna o mundo ao nosso redor compreensível, preenchendo-o de luz.
[Tornar o mundo compreensível é fazer as coisas terem
sentido]
E quando “agarramos/ tomamos” isto desta forma, somos “abraçados” pelo que o espírito tem a dar em nosso tempo, e então podemos verdadeiramente ser fortes o suficiente para encarar/enfrentar as forças de Ahriman.
Alguém com uma disposição semelhante à de Joana d'Arc não seria capaz de chegar à nada em nossos dias e em nossa época. Ela seria uma personalidade interessante e seria capaz de revelar muitas coisas maravilhosas por meio de profecias e outras formas. Uma pessoa capaz de fazer revelações íntimas é capaz de combater eficazmente as forças de Lúcifer. Hoje, porém, o homem/ser humano precisa resistir às forças de Ahriman, precisa se fortalecer para lidar/resistir a estas forças, desenvolvendo a força requerida na era de Michael. [Não uma mera repetição de eras anteriores]. Qualidades solares são requeridas nesta era de Michael, qualidades que incorporamos a nós mesmos através de espiritualizar/cristianizar os poderes que temos à nossa disposição entre o despertar e o dormir: os poderes do intelecto, da compreensão/ entendimento, do insight. Porque estes poderes de compreensão/entendimento que possuímos entrarão numa transformação na alma, se e tão somente tivermos a paciência suficiente. Estes são transformados de tal forma que a partir do que emerge para nós na ciência espiritual, surge a certeza de que o que estamos “agarrando/abraçando” ali é a expressão direta dos pensamentos do mundo espiritual. Então, não se questiona atualmente em nos retirarmos do mundo exterior, que possui forças ahrimânicas em qualquer lugar. Não, o que se faz necessário é que permaneçamos de pé neste mundo, e que ao mesmo tempo também nos fortalecemos para enfrentar/confrontar estas forças ahrimânicas.
Rudolf Steiner. GA157. O Destino de Indivíduos e Nações. 5.
A Natureza do Impulso Crístico e o Espírito Micaélico que o serve—II.19 de
janeiro de 1915, Berlim
https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA157/English/RSP1987/19150119p01.html
Ahriman is
resisted not by rejecting modernity, but by ensouling intelligence.
The
question therefore arises: How do we offer resistance to this Ahrimanic element
in our age, the way resistance was offered to the Luciferic element at the time
of Joan of Arc?
We offer
resistance to the Ahrimanic element by taking exactly the path that has been so
emphatically pointed out over and over again within our stream of spiritual
science—the path towards a spiritualization of human culture, of man's ability
to form ideas and concepts. This is why it has been stressed again and again
that there is a way in which everything spiritual science can give us, even if
to begin with it is largely presented to us from the spiritual world, can truly
and wholly and utterly be grasped with the intellect, the reason man has been
gifted with from the 16th century to this day. And if we say we do not
understand, then that is only because we listen to the prejudices current in
the materialism of our age. We must stop listening ever and again to the voice
of present-day materialism, a voice that speaks loudly at times and then again
in the faintest of whispers. Instead we must try and firmly focus our mind on
such powers of understanding as we have. Then the things spiritual science produces
for us will one day appear to be perfectly understandable, as something that
can be understood just as well as some event or other in the outside world can
be understood.
We generate
the great strength we need to offer resistance to the Ahrimanic forces by
approaching the spirit not merely through the inmost powers of revelation and
of faith, as in the case of Joan of Arc, but by trying to concentrate our
powers of understanding most intensely on what spiritual science has to give.
If we do this, the hour, the moment, will come when we have to say to
ourselves: What comes to us out of spiritual science is the only thing that is
rational and at the same time makes the world around us understandable, filling
it with light. And when we are taken hold of in this way we are taken hold of
by what the spirit has to give in our time so that we shall indeed be strong
enough to face the Ahrimanic forces.Someone with a disposition like that of
Joan of Arc would not be able to achieve anything in our day and age. She would
be an interesting personality and would be able to reveal many marvellous
things through prophesy and in other ways. Such a person capable of making
intimate revelations is capable of effectively countering Luciferic forces.
Today, however, man has to resist Ahrimanic forces, has to make himself strong
to cope with these forces, developing the strength required in the Michaelic
age. Sun-like qualities are called for in the age of Michael, qualities we take
into ourselves by spiritualizing the powers we have at our command between
waking up and going to sleep: the powers of the intellect, of understanding, of
insight. For these powers of understanding we possess will undergo a
transformation in the soul if only we have sufficient patience. They are
transformed to such effect that out of what emerges for us in spiritual science
there arises the certainty that what we are grasping there is the direct
expression of the thoughts of the spiritual world.
So there
can be no question today of withdrawing from the outside world which has
Ahrimanic forces in it everywhere. No, it is necessary for us to stand in this
world but at the same time also make ourselves strong to meet those Ahrimanic
forces.
Rudolf
Steiner. GA 157. The Destiny of Individuals and of Nations. 5. The Nature of
the Christ Impulse and the Michaelic Spirit Serving It—II. 19 January 1915,
Berlin
https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA157/English/RSP1987/19150119p01.html
5. The
Nature of the Christ Impulse and the Michaelic Sprit Serving It—II
Once again,
let us first of all direct our thoughts to those who are out there at the
front, in the arena of present-day events, where they have to stand for what
the time demands of them:
Spirits of
your souls, guardian guides,
On your wings let there be borne
The prayer of love from our souls
To those whom you guard here on earth.
Thus, united with your might,
A ray of help our prayer shall be
For the souls it seeks out there in love.
And for
those who have already gone through the gate of death:
Spirits of
your souls, guardian guides,
On your wings let there be borne
The prayer of love from our souls
To those whom you guard here on earth.
Thus, united with your might,
A ray of help our prayer shall be
For the souls it seeks out there in love.
May the
spirit we have been seeking for so many gears in our movement, the spirit who
has gone through the Mystery of Golgotha, be present above you, may it stream
through you and strengthen you for your difficult task.
It seems
that not everyone is quite clear about the verse I have just spoken, so I am
told. Let me stress that the proper version reads: Spirit of your souls.
The verse has been phrased in such a way that it can be used when many people
want to speak for one person or one for many or, indeed, many for many—as in
the present case. If it refers to just one person, the only change which has to
be made is to say ‘Spirit of your soul’ and so forth. It appears that I made a
slip of the tongue when I said the verse for the first time here some weeks
ago, so that the view has arisen that the words ‘Spirits of your souls’ may not
be quite correct. But they are correct as they stand. The first line is
addressed to the spirits of the souls requiring protection, as it were and the
‘your’ refers to those to whom our thoughts are directed. In the second line on
the other hand, the 'your' relates to the 'guardians'. Let me remark that such
verses are always such by nature that there can be problems with the purely
grammatical construction. But they are given from the spiritual world for the
specific purpose, and it is true that there are occasional problems with putting
the words together for such verses.
Dear
friends, it was for good reason and, spiritually, also very much in accord with
the work that has to be done in the present time, that two days ago we turned
our attention to events in the evolution of man that show how spiritual
impulses—and particularly the spiritual Impulses linked with the Mystery of
Golgotha, with the Christ impulse—are living impulses within the evolution of
man. We have seen how they were active in the evolution of man even though men
were unable to grasp the nature of the Christ impulse with their reason, with
their intellect.
It was with
this intention that reference was made among other historical events to Joan of
Arc through whom this Christ impulse resolved a major issue in the 15th century
through its servant, the Michaelic spirit, and for the good and advancement of
mankind. The reason why it was particularly important to refer to this event
was that in our day, too, it does hold true that everything destined to
regulate events on the historical scale is ordered and regulated from the
spiritual worlds. We need to be aware that the forces, the impulses, for what
is to happen come to us from the spiritual worlds. In this respect the same
holds true today as in the days of Joan of Arc. But the times are different.
What would happen in a particular way in the days of Joan or Arc has to happen
in a different way in our time and in times to come; it has to take a different
course. For our time is one that is entirely different. Since the 15th and 16th
century—and the Joan of Arc event did, of course, come in that period—mankind
had been guided in quite a different way. It is this difference, and
consequently the basic nature of our time, that we shall consider to some
extent today.
Between
going to sleep and waking up we are in a soul state where that which we really
are is outside our physical and our ether bodies. Asleep, we live in our astral
body and our ego. We need to have a very clear picture of this. That which we
really are is then outside our physical and our ether bodies. Asleep, we live
in our astral body and our ego. We need to have a very clear picture of this.
That which we really are is then outside the body. We are, of course, bound to
our body to an extraordinary degree between birth and death so that in terms of
space we are not far away from our body when asleep. Our soul element is spread
out in our surroundings, as it were; that is in everything that specifically
makes up our environment.
Let us get a clear picture of how the environment has changed specifically over
the last centuries—since the 15th and 16 centuries—at least for the great
majority of the people whom we have to consider in relation to what fate has
decreed for the present age. Just consider whether any of the machinery or the
mechanical contrivances we use today also existed at the time when Joan of Arc
did her work. We can certainly say that the world has changed completely since
that time as far as mechanical things are concerned. Everything we experience
in relation to machines has only come since then. There may be some observant
people among you who have taken a ‘sleeper’ (train) to travel overnight. They
may have had the strange experience of waking up—and this is the kind of
occasion when one may wake up quite frequently—and finding that something was
still rumbling on that was inherent in the machinery of the train all about
them. Something can be perceived, as it were, when one is waking up but still
in a dream state, of the croaking and squealing of the train or boat one
happens to be on. This happens because the soul is not really in the body but
in the area around the body and is placed among those mechanical contrivances.
Yet it is
not only on such less usual occasions that we live among the hustle and bustle
of the present age, and we can certainly say that the mechanized life has also
spread to the countryside today. Fundamentally speaking, we are always within
the mechanized life of the present age. When asleep, the soul merges into
everything that is mechanism. Those are mechanisms, however, which we have
constructed ourselves. A mechanism we have built is something quite different
from nature outside us, for this has been constructed by the elemental spirits.
When we are out in the woods, for instance, where everything has been built up
by the spirits of nature, we are in an environment that is totally different
from the environment of mechanical contrivances created by ourselves. What are
we doing when we take things from nature and put them together to make the
machines and appliances we use in our lives? We are in that case not merely
putting together physical components, for in putting together physical
components we always provide opportunity for a demonic Ahrimanic servant to
unite with the machine. We do this with every machine, every mechanism, in
everything of this kind that is part of modern civilization, providing a point
of attachment for demonic elemental spirits of Ahrimanic nature. And living
surrounded by machines we live together with these demonic Ahrimanic
elementals. We allow them to enter into us; we allow not only the squealing and
groaning of machines to enter into us but also an element that is eminently
destructive for our spirit and our soul.
Please
note—and I have often made a similar comment on similar occasions—what I am
saying is not intended to be a criticism of our Ahrimanic age. It has to be
like this, that we allow demons to stream into everything and allow ourselves
to the surrounded by them. It is part of the evolution of mankind. We have to
acknowledge the simple necessity for this and understand the real impulse of
spiritual science. And so we shall not sing the praises of people who say it is
necessary, as far as possible, to protect oneself from the demons and to shun
civilization and that we should set up a colony as far away as possible in the
wilderness to save us from having anything to do with these demonic Ahrimanic
elementals. That has never been the tenor of my words. I have always said that
we must entirely accept what comes to us out of the necessity of evolution,
that we must not let ourselves be induced to flee from the world. We need to
take heed, however, we need to understand, that conditions are such in our age
that we are filling our environment more and more with beings of a demonic
nature, that we are more and more involved with the principle that is
mechanizing our civilization. An age such as this calls for something quite
different than the age out of which Joan of Arc was called to do her work. In
the time of Joan of Arc it was necessary for the impulse out of which she was
to act to be born out of the gentlest, the most subtle powers of the human
soul. Just consider: she was a shepherd girl living a very simple, natural
life, with nature at her most idyllic. She was very young when her visions came
to her, and through the Imaginations given to her she had a direct link with
the spiritual world. Out of her inner being she was to bring forth everything
that was to be the foundation from which she acted, she was to let it grow
forth from her inner being. And not only this, but it was necessary for very
special circumstances to be brought about so that through the most subtle
powers inherent in the human soul her mission could be imprinted in her soul,
in her very heart of hearts.
We know
that everything in the world goes in cycles, that things happen in such a way
that important events come up in definite cycles. If we take the year of Joan's
birth, 1412, we can ask a specific question relating to this. We are able to
say that the year this Maid of Orleans was born the sun would of course have
been in a particular position, astronomical position, coinciding with one of
the constellations in the zodiac. The progress of the sun from one sign of the
zodiac to the next marks a major time interval. Passing right through the
zodiac the sun will go through all twelve constellations; the time interval
needed for the sun to progress from one constellation in the zodiac to the next
is approximately 2,160 years, and this is important. Going back approximately
2,160 years from the birth of Joan of Arc we come to the founding of Rome.
In the days
when Rome was founded anyone needing information on major issues concerning the
city which was then coming into being would go to see the nymph Egeria. There
it was possible to get information, from a seeress. But, as I said, that was
one solar cycle earlier. And so the times are renewed and everything goes in
cycles. Let us visualize it like this: at the time when Rome was founded the
sun was at a certain point in the constellation of the Ram, Aries. It then
progressed to the Fishes, Pisces, so that it had moved through one-twelfth of
the zodiac. And thus the cycle which inevitably has to be there In the
evolution of mankind takes us from the nymph Egeria to the inspired deed of
Joan of Arc. In ancient Rome, however, it was a matter of pagan Inspiration, of
pagan deeds. If we try to think of the same visionary element that operated at
the time when Rome was founded also having to operate in a Christian age,
acting from within, through the most tender powers inherent in man, what did
have to come about? You can imagine that something had to come about which
again, in some way or other, had to do with the subtlest powers of the
Christian faith.
Most of you
will remember my telling you of the variation we get in the course of the year
in the forces that link us with the spiritual world. In summer, at St John's
tide when the sun's rays are most powerful externally, one might perhaps
achieve an external ecstasy and, as in the old Celtic mysteries, lift oneself
up into the spiritual world in some way, but certainly in ecstasy. Yet when the
days are shortest, when the sun's rays are least powerful and the winter night
the darkest, around Christmas therefore, the opportunity exists also to win
through to the spiritual worlds in our innermost soul life. All who have known
of the cycle of the year have always maintained, quite rightly, that those who
have the gift for it are able to enter into the most intimate aspect of our
connection with the spiritual worlds during the time from the 21st, the 23rd of
December to about the 6th of January—during those days and particularly the
nights. There are legends—the Legend of Olaf Asteson has been
read to you here—which tell of people having their most profound Inspirations
during those days.26 This, again, is connected with the
celebration of Christmas at that time, of the birth of the spirit who went
through the Mystery of Golgotha and is connected with the innermost powers in
human soul development. So, if the Inspiration of pagan Rome of old was to be
resurrected one sun cycle later, 2,160 years later, it had to come in through
the aspect of man that is most utterly childlike. This means that the soul of
Joan of Arc had to be taken hold of at the point where souls are taken hold of
most profoundly, where they are weakest in relation to earthly things, and
where the Christ impulse is not yet hampered by worldly impressions—the souls
not yet having taken up the earthly element, so that the Christ impulse can be
the only one to enter into the soul sphere. The most favourable timing for this
would have been for the Maid of Orleans to have gone through the time of the
Thirteen Nights in her mother's womb immediately before her birth, before she
took her first breath. And, indeed, she did—for she was born on the 6th of
January.
Here we
perceive the more profound forces at work which enter into the physical world
from the spiritual worlds. We see how they find the channels they need, deeply
mysterious channels. There can be nothing more marvellous for someone with
insight into such things, nothing more open to explanation through spiritual
science, than this fact that the Maid of Orleans took her first breath on earth
in the time around Christmas, on the 6th of January, with the days of Christmas
immediately preceding her entry on to the physical plane. We see how the girl
who was to go through death at the age of 19 was taken hold of at the point
where the most subtle of human powers lie, and we are therefore looking into a
time when it was necessary for the divine spiritual powers to find a channel
through the inmost inwardness of the human soul. That, however, was the last
time when such a thing was to be. It was the time when a particular order was
brought into Europe through the Christ impulse, as I indicated to you the last
time, and this happened in the wonderful way in which it did happen through
Joan of Arc. Since then, however, times have changed. Today is not the time
when divine spiritual powers approach the human soul in such intimate fashion.
What was
the mission of Joan of Arc, really, if we consider something that was present
throughout her whole life? She was taken hold of from within by the forces of
the divine spiritual world. In her soul these forces encountered the Luciferic
forces. These Luciferic forces were mighty and powerful at that time. Joan of
Arc bore something within her that made her vanquish the Luciferic forces. She
vanquished the Luciferic forces, that is entirely obvious to anyone who wants
to see. We have briefly considered the miracle of her birth and seen that she
went through an unconscious initiation, in a way, up to Epiphany, the day known
as that of the manifestation of Christ. But we can also point to her death
which occurred because all the Luciferic forces of her enemies joined together
to bring about her death. Her misadventure in a battle was brought about
through the jealousy of the men who were the official leaders, appointed to
guide the battle. All the jealousy then came to the fore over the
manifestations of spiritual forces and spiritual powers that were made through
her. She was put on trial. The records of the trial still exist and anyone
studying them can see—unless of course his mind is as closed as that of Anatole
France—that this Maid of Orleans, having come into the physical world in a very
special way, through the thirteen nights, also left it in such a way. For it
says in the records, so that there is historical proof, that she said that she
would indeed die but that after her death the English would meet with a much
greater reverse than any they had known before, and that this would happen
within the next seven years.
If we take
this rightly, in its spiritual sense, it means nothing less than that the soul
of Joan of Arc on going through the gate of death was prepared to continue
contributing to the work of shaping events after her death, to share in the
work whatever her form of existence. And she did so. What the spiritual powers
have to bring about will be brought about whatever the external conditions may
be. Joan's adversaries were able to bring about her death, to mount the
strongest possible attack against her, as it were. They were not able to
prevent her mission.
However,
the forces of Joan of Arc were only able to work in the subtle way they did
during her time. In everything she did the Luciferic forces were ranged against
her. We are also having to deal with hostile forces in our time, but these are
predominantly Ahrimanic forces, the Ahrimanic forces that have come up with the
materialistic age. These are in evidence even in the outer form and fashion of
the whole of our age if we turn our attention to the mechanisms, the mechanical
element of the age; if we are aware that, fundamentally speaking, we are
offering an abode to demons when we produce our mechanical contrivances,
surrounding ourselves with a whole world of Ahrimanic demons. It is evident
also from other things that Ahrimanic powers are at work everywhere in our age.
We need only look back a few years and pay a little attention to the occult
substrate to our life on earth and we can see Ahrimanic forces influencing all
aspects of our physical life on earth. Not only the kind of demons we create in
our machines influence our earth life but also other kinds of Ahrimanic forces.
The occultist has to put into words something I have often put into words for
one group of friends or another: that, fundamentally speaking, the sad and
painful events now happening all over Europe and a large part of the globe have
long been in preparation. War has been present for a long time, as it were, in
the astral world but was held back by something that was also astral: by the
fear everybody was feeling. Fear is an astral element; it was able to hold the
war back, to prevent it; fear was able to stop war from breaking out for all
that time.
For fear
was abroad everywhere. Fear is altogether something that is most dreadfully
widespread in the depths of our souls in the present age. A time came, however,
when there was an external indication in time of something often referred to
when the starting points of this war are discussed. This outer aspect is not
the one that matters, however, it is merely a symbol. As I said on a previous
occasion, the assassination of the Austrian Archduke occurred and there emerged
the event, so terrible to the soul, that I have already referred to. I had
never before known anything like this, not from personal experience nor through
other occultists. We know what the soul goes through when it has undergone
death. In the case of the soul that went through death at that time something
very specific showed itself. All the elements of fear began to gather around
it, as though around a focal point, and something of a cosmic power could now
be perceived in it. We know already that anything that has a specific character
on the physical plane will have the opposite character in the spiritual world.
This also held true in the present case. An element that first had had a
dispersive effect where war was concerned was now acting in the opposite way,
as a spur, an incitement, to war. So we see that a metamorphosis, as it were,
of the elements of fear, of the Ahrimanic elements, became mixed up with all
the things that finally led to the sad and painful events of the present time.
Ahrimanic elements are indeed at work everywhere in our time. We must not rebel
against this, nor should we aim to protect ourselves against it. We have to see
it as something that is necessary in our time, something that has to be present
in our time. The question is: How do we find the right attitude to this? How do
we find the one thing that will show us what should be our attitude now, in the
present age, if we want to make it possible for divine spiritual forces and
powers to enter into our actions?
Here I must
refer to an event in the spiritual world that happened a few decades ago. I
have mentioned this on a number of occasions, in all kinds of different
contexts. It is an event that occurred behind the scenes of our existence, in
the spiritual world, in or about November 1879.27 We
know that there is a different regent of earth life for every epoch, as it
were; one regent follows another. Until 1879 the spirit acting out of the
spiritual world was the one we call the spirit Gabriel, if a name is to be
used. From 1879 onwards it was the spirit we call Michael. It is Michael who
directs events in our time. Anyone able to see into the spiritual worlds in
conscious awareness will feel the spirit Michael to be the spirit who truly is
the one to lead and govern in our time. Michael is in a way the most powerful
of the leading spirits of the age that follow one another. In a way, I said, he
is the most powerful of these spirits. The others have been predominantly
active in the spirit sphere. Michael had the strength to push the spirit right
through into the physical world. He was the spirit who descended to earth ahead
of the Christ, as it were, before the Mystery of Golgotha approached, and
governed world affairs for four or five centuries at that time. Now in our time
he is again the leading spirit on earth. We may make a comparison by saying
that Michael is among the spirits belonging to the hierarchy of the Archangeloi
as gold is among the metals. Whilst all other metals act predominantly on the
ether body, gold also acts as a medicine for the physical body. In the same way
all the other leading spirits act on the soul whilst it is Michael who at the
same time is able to act on the physical intellect, on physical reason. Now
that his age has come it is possible to act out of the spirit on the physical
intellect, on physical reason. In the 15th century he was not the actual leader
and therefore had to find a way in the case of Joan without making use of the
human intellect, human understanding, human ability to form ideas; a way that
was wholly an inner one, as it were, through the innermost powers of the human
soul. The Christ influenced Joan of Arc through his Michaelic spirit, but he
achieved what had to be done by any other means rather than the forces of the
intellect and of reason.
Luciferic
spirits are also present today. and these prefer to attack man from within.
They want to generate all kinds of passions, but not the error of the
intellect, the error of common reason that we have to struggle with in our
present age. We therefore have to say that anything we wish to achieve in the
spiritual sphere must be achieved in such a way that it is in accord with the
forces that Michael, the leading spirit of the age, commands. We are in close
alliance with Michael when we try to grasp what we have been attempting to
grasp these last few days, when we try and grasp things as phenomena, to grasp
what we call the German folk spirit. Two powers: Michael and the German folk
spirit. These two are entirely in harmony, and it is their mission to bring the
Christ impulse to expression specifically in our time, in accord with the
character of our time. For it would be wrong for the people of our time to
think that the same inward way of working that was appropriate to the 15th
century could still be appropriate now that we are in the fifth post-Atlantean
era. In the present age it is a matter above all of understanding that it is
necessary to be chained to Ahriman, to Ahrimanic elements we ourselves create
in our machines, and that it is necessary to recognize clearly how these things
are connected. Otherwise we live in fear of many of the things that exist in
the present age.
The
question therefore arises: How do we offer resistance to this Ahrimanic element
in our age, the way resistance was offered to the Luciferic element at the time
of Joan of Arc? We offer resistance to the Ahrimanic element by taking exactly
the path that has been so emphatically pointed out over and over again within
our stream of spiritual science—the path towards a spiritualization of human
culture, of man's ability to form ideas and concepts. This is why it has been
stressed again and again that there is a way in which everything spiritual
science can give us, even if to begin with it is largely presented to us from
the spiritual world, can truly and wholly and utterly be grasped with the
intellect, the reason man has been gifted with from the 16th century to this
day. And if we say we do not understand, then that is only because we listen to
the prejudices current in the materialism of our age. We must stop listening
ever and again to the voice of present-day materialism, a voice that speaks
loudly at times and then again in the faintest of whispers. Instead we must try
and firmly focus our mind on such powers of understanding as we have. Then the
things spiritual science produces for us will one day appear to be perfectly
understandable, as something that can be understood just as well as some event
or other in the outside world can be understood. We generate the great strength
we need to offer resistance to the Ahrimanic forces by approaching the spirit
not merely through the inmost powers of revelation and of faith, as in the case
of Joan of Arc, but by trying to concentrate our powers of understanding most
intensely on what spiritual science has to give. If we do this, the hour, the
moment, will come when we have to say to ourselves: What comes to us out of
spiritual science is the only thing that is rational and at the same time makes
the world around us understandable, filling it with light. And when we are
taken hold of in this way we are taken hold of by what the spirit has to give
in our time so that we shall indeed be strong enough to face the Ahrimanic
forces.
Someone
with a disposition like that of Joan of Arc would not be able to achieve
anything in our day and age. She would be an interesting personality and would
be able to reveal many marvellous things through prophesy and in other ways.
Such a person capable of making intimate revelations is capable of effectively
countering Luciferic forces. Today, however, man has to resist Ahrimanic
forces, has to make himself strong to cope with these forces, developing the
strength required in the Michaelic age. Sun-like qualities are called for in
the age of Michael, qualities we take into ourselves by spiritualizing the
powers we have at our command between waking up and going to sleep: the powers
of the intellect, of understanding, of insight. For these powers of understanding
we possess will undergo a transformation in the soul if only we have sufficient
patience. They are transformed to such effect that out of what emerges for us
in spiritual science there arises the certainty that what we are grasping there
is the direct expression of the thoughts of the spiritual world. So there can
be no question today of withdrawing from the outside world which has Ahrimanic
forces in it everywhere. No, it is necessary for us to stand in this world but
at the same time also make ourselves strong to meet those Ahrimanic forces.
It is a
matter therefore of finding the way towards understanding the spiritual world
with the very same powers we also use to understand the outside world. That, of
course, is the way—as we have said on these few occasions—that is inwardly
bound up with the whole mission of the German people, and specifically with
this mission as it has been from the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th
centuries. This mission was in preparation during the preceding centuries. This
is what is so remarkable—what has been going on in the intellectual life of
Germany, through its poets, its artists and philosophers, is intimately bound
up with the spiritual life. Here it really is a matter of boldly looking the
facts in the face, without sympathy or antipathy, and seeing how they were
first in preparation and gradually took shape. We have ourselves had the
experience of simply having to stress one day that there is this necessity to
be active in the life of the intellect and spirit as it continues to progress.
Why should that be so?
Let us try
and take a look at the theosophical movement we had external links with for a
time, the theosophical movement in England. Try and build a bridge for
yourselves between the general intellectual life in England, including the
field of philosophy, and English theosophy. Externally they stand side by side,
are two streams running side by side, and a bridge between the two is something
we can only make in a very external way. Try on the other hand and consider the
life of the mind and spirit that had its preparatory stages in the German
mystics Meister Eckhart and Johannes Tauler, and then evolved further through
Jakob Boehme and Angelus Silesius.28
In Lessing21
it brought acceptance of the idea of repeated earth lives, and in
Goethe's Faust an out-and-out glorification of the ascent to
the spiritual worlds.
There you
have the straight route from the outer worlds to the spiritual world. If you
then also include the stream that led from Goethe's Fairy Tale of the
Green Snake and the Fair Lily29 to the dramatization
of the basic forces of initiation30 and take the two
streams together, you will have the inner connection. There is an inner
connection between that which finally makes its appearance as spiritual science
and that which is striven for quite exoterically in the intellectual life of the
physical world. The life of the mind and spirit which unfolds outside of
spiritual science is of course striven for with the powers of the intellect,
but it is compelled to move in the direction of what is found outside the body.
I should like to put it like this: It is the mission of the German people that
they cannot do anything else but let the river of all their endeavours finally
enter into spiritual life. In spiritual terms that really means that the German
people are called to unite inwardly with the element that comes into the world
because Michael is the leader. Such a union is not achieved by passively,
fatalistically, allowing oneself to be governed by the powers of destiny. It is
achieved by recognizing the challenge of the time.
What I am
trying to show has been revealed not only inwardly, in the evolution of German
mysticism, but also outwardly in the whole way German life has developed within
the context of European life. In the first of the last two public lectures I
have given, ‘The Germanic Soul and the German Intellect’, I discussed the way
the soul quality of the Germanic tribes flowed into the peoples of the West and
the South, as it were, through those who became the outposts of those tribes,
the Goths, Lombards, Vandals. The Germanic soul element was sacrificed on the
altar of mankind. Later this was to repeat itself, though less obviously so.
Consider first of all the most eastern part of Austria31 and
the people known as the Transylvanian Saxons. They had emigrated from the
Rhine, from the Siebengebirge (Seven Mountains), and there is external evidence
to prove this. As time went on they lost their special characteristics. The
soul substance gave itself up, to merge into that of the other nation, and
little will be left of them one day except for some elements from their
language; it was as folk substance that they flowed into the other nation. Now
let us move on south to the Banat.32 Swabian immigrants
settled there and the Magyar element overgrew the Swabian element. The same
thing has happened in the Carpathian mountains in Hungary. To all appearances
these immigrant elements have disappeared today. Yet they are still alive everywhere
among the present-day population, sometimes emerging in tiny rivulets, like in
the fascinating linguistic enclave of the people of Gottschee in Krain
[Carniola]. And elsewhere as well. We see—and it would be possible to purse
this a great deal further—how the Germanic soul-element has been sent out into
the world, how it has an effect there. This happens out of an inner necessity.
It happened like this in earlier ages and particularly also during the age of
Gabriel. It happened throughout the age of Gabriel in that the blood—I would
say the blood and the mixing of blood—was active, everything which, whilst
connected with external circumstances in life, yet cannot be grasped
externally, but again takes place at a more inward level.
Now the
Michael age has come,the age when we must grasp how, through the whole past
development of the life of the mind and intellect, the German spirit is able to
take its place within the Sun force of Michael. That we simply have to realize.
And it can be realized by giving recognition to spiritual science, by
gradually—on the basis of what spiritual science is considering—getting an idea
and an awareness of the spiritual powers that are at work, of the reality of
spiritual powers. Then we shall gradually come to understand how senseless it
is for people to say: ‘There are no spiritual forces, I cannot acknowledge
them. And if I have a bar of iron in horseshoe form here, then it is just that,
a bar of iron, and I see nothing but iron.’ But there may be magnetic forces
within it. And in the same way something else, something quite different from
magnetic forces, lies within the whole of the outside world. We come to
recognize it if we really consider all that is presented to us as the
characteristic form of things. That is the way to achieve the powers of mind
needed in the age of Michael to resist the Ahrimanic powers, at a time when it
is indeed our duty to withstand the Ahrimanic powers. Fundamentally speaking,
everything the study of spiritual science has to offer is merely preparatory.
One day an awakening of the soul will spring forth from the study of spiritual
science, and the soul will know: Within you lives the spiritual world, from the
Christ impulse down through Michael to the folk spirit which puts into effect
what has to be put into effect.
I have said
that the time of Joan of Arc was one when it was possible to act on the
weakest, physically the weakest, powers of man. Our age is one where it is
necessary to act on the strongest powers of man, to take hold of the will at a
point where it is least inclined truly to unfold its powers. We can see it
again and again: the thing people find most difficult to do is to unfold the
will at the point where our earthly powers, the powers by which we form
concepts, are made inwardly active. To bring ‘will-power’ to bear externally is
something people still find relatively easy. But a different kind of
‘will-power’ is needed to guide our thoughts in such a way that they encompass
the spiritual world. Spiritual science as such has to appeal to that strong will-power,
for this must be there if spiritual science is truly to lead where it ought to
lead in our Michaelic age. For we are not called to discuss the mechanical
element in our age; we are not called to point out that this mechanical element
in our age has laid hold of mankind; we are called to do something else.
Of course,
if we squeeze the facts a little it will be possible for us to become a
philosopher, to some degree even a great philosopher—this we admit without
reserve. It is possible to look at the machines in our age and start to
consider this very mechanistic aspect as the most pernicious of all things,
ascribing it specifically to our enemies. And one then has the inclination,
even if one may be considered a great philosopher, to hurl abuse like a market
woman. One can then do the same as the philosopher Bergson33 who
only recently again managed to point out rather one sidedly—and many things
tend to be perfectly correct if a one sided view is presented—how the
mechanistic effect of the forces relates to the essential nature of the German
people. But that is not the only thing we can point to—that German brainpower
has achieved things in certain areas by applying mechanical principles—for
something else may be pointed out as well. Nor is it necessary to hurl abuse
like a market woman when discussing such matters, and instead we may say:
Perhaps the very place where the intellect has the greatest powers to give form
to the mechanistic and demonic element is also the place where these
mechanistic and demonic powers can be overcome on the basis of our particular
spiritual mission. Then however, a German may easily get himself misunderstood
as he comes to see, in conjunction with the way the intellectual life has
developed, that it is not his function to stop at the purely mechanical element
that is of such great service to him also in the present day, with the
challenges presented by the war. He must not stop at what is merely mechanism,
for then he would merely create demons. No, he must develop powerful forces
within him that can boldly face these demons. This means that we have to stand
in the spiritual world, not blindly but in a way that arises from, and is
guided by, conviction. If we set out to acknowledge that we are surrounding
ourselves with a world of demons, a veritable hell, as we design and build
machine after machine, we can of course understand why people speaking out of
the materialistic spirit of the present age are saying over and over again that
this scientific and materialistic age has taken us to the greatest height ever
achieved by man. Of course we can understand this for it is in line with the
materialistic thought of the present time, but we must know that with those
machines we are introducing nothing but demons for mankind and we must know how
to develop the right powers to resist these demons. We only gain the right
attitude to the spiritual world by recognizing these demonic Ahrimanic forces,
by knowing full well that they are present. For the harmful powers are harmful
only when we remain unconscious of them, when we know nothing about them. Let
me illustrate this by means of a comparison.
As you
know, we hope after some time to have a building at Dornach near Basle where we
can nurture our spiritual stream in suitable surroundings. It is not a question
of erecting this building to escape the pressures of our time in some way or
other, but rather of building it entirely out of the pressures of our time. It
was necessary for instance to design a lighting system out of the most
Ahrimanic forces of the present age, electric lighting, electric heating and so
on. It is a matter of using the architectural form as such to render such
potentially harmful things harmless. It could have been the case that anyone
entering the building in the future would have been surrounded with everything
the Ahrimanic culture of the present age leads to. The point, however, is not
that it is present, but that people do not notice it. We are not suppose to
notice it. To achieve this, a number of friends got together and they are
erecting a separate building for this, giving it a special form, so that the
demonic Ahrimanic forces are banished to this place. Anyone approaching the
building, and also anyone entering it, will have it brought to their notice
that the Ahrimanic forces are at work there. For as soon as we know this they
are no longer harmful. The point is that the powers that have a bad effect on
man cease to do so when we take a good look at the places where they are
active, when we do not look at a machine thoughtlessly and say ‘a machine is
simply a machine’ , but rather acknowledge that a machine is a place where a
demonic Ahrimanic entity may be found.
If we take
our stand in the world with knowledge in our souls we take the right stand in
the Michaelic age. It means that we relate to the spiritual world in such a way
that Michael, too, can be active within us; Michael with his present mission,
as we have described it. The point is that in every case we can either enter
without thought into what exists in the mechanical contrivances men are
producing at an unconscious level or we can see through life. If we see through
it, if we become aware of the demonic elemental powers at work in the machines
we produce, we shall find the way to the rightful givers of Inspiration who are
true to the spirit. They are connected with the spirit who is to the other
spirits concerned with guidance of man as gold is to the other metals—with
Michael.
My aim
today has been to show that the mission of our age is to seek the divine
spiritual powers that will work for the good of mankind. It is different from
the mission given to the human souls who lived at the time of Joan of Arc. At
that time it was much more a question of holding back anything intellectual,
holding back the power of reasoning. Today, however, it is a question of
cultivating everything to do with reason and intellect to attain to
clairvoyance, for it is possible to cultivate it and attain to clairvoyance.
Once there are people who cultivate the human soul in this way, the twilight
period we are now living through will evolve into what it destined to evolve.
Everything that evolves on the physical plane can only be the outer garment for
the spiritual life that is to arise for mankind out of the present time.
And it is
true that those who are now sacrificing their powers in the years of their
youth are prepared to send these powers down into our earthly existence. For
these powers are never lost, they are indestructible- Now, however, they are
destined to continue to act spiritually as they would have continued to act
physically if the people concerned had not gone through the gate of death on
the field of battle. They will continue to send their powers down to earth and
into our time, so that we shall know what to do with these powers. These powers
need to stream down into a human race that shall use them in such a way, during
the time of peace that will follow the war, that spiritual life spreads more
and more on earth. As the light of day always arises from the night, so a
future filled with light will have to arise out of our present which so often
seems like a dark night to us. This future will have to be filled not only with
light but with everything the Michaelic age, which started in 1871, has to
bring for mankind. Once there are souls capable of establishing as intimate a
bond with the spiritual world as has been indicated today, we shall be able to
hope that where the events of the present time are concerned, the thought
expressed in the seven lines of the mantram will come to fruition. We may hope
that it will all be fulfilled—if the first five lines are really and truly
connected with the last two:
Out of the blood shed in war,
Out of the grief of those who are left,
Out of the people's deeds of sacrifice
Spirit fruits will come to grow
If souls with knowledge of the spirit
Turn their mind to spirit realms.
