Wellspring: Anthroposophia : Our Very Own Being : Our Spirit Self : Manas

Sunday, October 17, 2021

Anthroposophia : Our Very Own Being : Our Spirit Self : Manas

Ex Deo Nascimur In Christo Morimur Per Spiritum Sanctum Reviviscimus

Rudolf Steiner:

We know that we are living in the age that is preparing the Spirit Self [Manas]. Thus we know that, though we live in the age of the Consciousness Soul, the Spirit Self is being prepared. Just as the Greeks lived in the age of the Intellectual Soul, and looked toward the dawn of the Consciousness Soul, so we live the age of the Consciousness Soul and seek to prepare the age of the Spirit Self. The Greeks established philosophy, which, despite Paul Deussen and others, did first exist in Greece during the unfolding of the Intellectual Soul when human beings still directly experienced the lingering influence of the objective Sophia; and Philosophy then came into being, and Dante could view her as a real, concrete being who brought him consolation when Beatrice was torn from him by death; in the same way, we now live in the age of the Consciousness Soul and look toward the dawn of the age of the Spirit Self, and we know in this way that something is again becoming objective to human beings — something that looks forward the coming times that will be gained by what we have won through the time of the Consciousness Soul.

What, therefore, must be developed? It must unfold that, once again, as a matter of course, a "Sophia" becomes present. But we must learn to relate this Sophia to the Consciousness Soul, bring her down directly to human beings. This is happening during the age of the Consciousness Soul. And thereby Sophia becomes the being who directly enlightens human beings. After Sophia has entered human beings, she must take their being with her and present it to them outwardly, objectively. Thus Sophia will be drawn into the human soul and arrive at the point of being so inwardly connected with it that a love poem as beautiful as Dante wrote may be written about her.

Sophia will become objective again, but she will take with her what humanity is, and objectively present herself in this form. Thus she will present herself not only as Sophia, but as Anthroposophia — as the Sophia who, after passing through the human soul, through the very being of the human being, henceforth bears that being within her, and in this form she will confront enlightened human beings as the objective being Sophia who once stood before the Greeks.

Such is the progression of human evolutionary history in relation to the spiritual questions we have been considering. Here I must leave the matter to all those who wish to examine in even greater detail, following the destiny of Sophia, Philosophia, and Anthroposophia, how we may show how humanity develops progressively through those parts of the soul we call the Intellectual Soul, the Consciousness Soul, and the Spirit Self. People will learn how profoundly what anthroposophy gives us is based in our whole being. What we receive through anthroposophy is our very own being. This once floated toward us in the form of a celestial goddess with whom we were able to enter into relationship. This divine being lived on as Sophia and Philosophia, and now we can once again bring her out of ourselves and place her before us as the fruit of true anthroposophical self-knowledge. We can wait patiently until the world is willing to test the depth of the foundations of what we have to say, right down to the smallest details. It is the essence of anthroposophy that its own being consists of the being of the human, and its effectiveness, its reality, consists in that we receive from anthroposophy what we ourselves are and what we must place before ourselves, because we must practice self-knowledge.