The Gospel of John and the Other Three Gospels
Lecture 11 of 11
Rudolf Steiner, Stockholm
January 15, 1910
The Gospel of John is therefore not only an historical account of the event in Palestine, but also a description of the seven stages of the Christian initiation. Those who have undergone this do not need external evidence of the historical event, because they already know it from the Akasha Chronicle. This is also the path from the historical to the mystical Christ.
With the help of these documents, it is no longer difficult for us to resolve the apparent contradictions in the Gospels. The men who wrote them describe the events in Palestine according to what they each knew from their own initiation. That is why, as far as the inner experiences are concerned, the Gospel written by the man initiated by the Christ Himself is the most important. The other evangelists were initiated in different mystery temples. So when they saw the same great drama, which had been presented in an exemplary way in the initiation temples, unfold as a real event in physical life at Golgotha, they knew that the great initiator of humanity had come and that they could now describe the initiation drama and apply it to Christ Jesus. According as they turned their attention to one or another feature of his life, they saw and understood different phases of it.
But the ceremony of initiation was not the same in different temples, so they often gave the same events in different ways and in different words. So they also gave different versions of Jesus' last words on the cross. In Matthew and Mark, they are as follows: “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani!” - My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? [Elohai, Elohai lama sabachthani! - My gods, why have you left me, why have you forsaken me?]
These words are not an initiation formula in the strict sense in Matthew and Mark. After the initiate in the Egyptian or Pythagorean mysteries had been placed in a coffin or stretched out on a cross by hierophants, he lived in the spiritual world for three and a half days. When he was resurrected, everything he had experienced was clearly present in his consciousness. It was a deeply moving moment for him when all these experiences arose from within him like powerful, living images. At that moment, words such as “My God, how you have glorified me!” escaped his lips.
In the Nordic mysteries, in which the initiate had, as it were, extinguished his own soul life and merged with the cosmos, another exclamation escaped him, such as: “My God, why have you forsaken me!” The experiences he then had in the spiritual world gave him the answer to this question. These words are therefore not an exclamation of pain, but a repetition of the initiation ceremony and an expression of the overwhelming impressions that the initiate has received in the spiritual world.
[The two initiations were to merge: the extinguishing of one's own inner self, merging into the great cosmos, was compressed into the words, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” The answer was given to him by the spiritual world outside.
The fact that the evangelists rendered Jesus' words from the cross in different ways is due to their different initiations. They saw the Golgotha mystery as an act in the initiation drama, and each of them had focused their attention on words and expressions that corresponded to what they were accustomed to seeing and hearing on that occasion. That is why Mark, who was initiated into the northern mysteries, was able to hear the words: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” While Luke, the therapist, who had developed a particular ability for great self-mastery as an instrument of the healing powers of the cosmos, naturally had to hear different words. In the temples where the therapists were trained, it was understood that the initiate's own inner self must first be silenced if the spiritual powers of the cosmos were to be able to work through him, and the success of his work was based precisely on his ability to completely forget himself and to be only a tool for higher powers. That is why Luke heard the words from the cross: “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” For these words were the words of the initiated therapist in the last act of initiation - and which Luke was accustomed to hearing.
[Overcoming the powers of thought - John.
Overcoming the powers of feeling - Luke.
Training of the magical powers of the will - Mark.
Harmony - Matthew.
In Christ, as the greatest of all initiates, the magical art of healing and wisdom were united, and therefore each of the evangelists was able to place into his mouth the words that he already knew from his own temple of initiation.
John, as the one initiated by Christ Himself, looked deeper into His nature than anyone else and therefore understood His mission on earth better than anyone else. To understand Jesus' mission, we must first realize the goal of our earth. What is the actual mission of the earth? Our earth is, as we know, a reincarnation of other planetary beings. In a previous incarnation, it was the moon; before that, the sun; and before the solar period, it had been Saturn. If we look back at the last one, the lunar period, we find no signs of what we might call love – neither at the lower nor at the higher stages of development. There was no inner attraction from being to being, no spiritual love on the Moon. Instead, the beings that lived there were driven to work together by an unconscious, instinctive law. When a weight pushes down a scale, one does not speak of love. Nor can this law, which drove these beings to each other, be called love. Wisdom was slowly implanted during the development of the moon, and that is why we find wisdom everywhere on our earth.
In the same way, love is to be implanted during the evolution of the earth, so that during the next incarnation on earth, love will radiate towards all beings – just as we now encounter wisdom everywhere. This love, which during the Lemurian period only functioned at the lowest level as physical love, should become more and more perfected and spiritualized with the evolution of the Earth, so that in the next incarnation on Earth, as Jupiter, everything should be permeated and radiate with love, just as everything is now permeated with wisdom.
Six hundred years before Christ, humanity received the teaching of compassion and love for the first time through Buddha. But if some people in our day are mature enough to be able to realize this teaching, it is through the spiritual power that the Christ has brought to the human race. Let us demonstrate this with an example. If we think, for example, of the Sistine Madonna: we can evoke the image in our memory, we can also partially understand it. But does that mean we can paint it? There is a big difference between understanding a thing and executing it. And just as it is greater to be able to paint the picture than merely to understand it, so too is the power of love more than just the teaching of love and compassion.
The Christ poured this power of love and compassion into humanity, but this could not happen without the Golgotha mystery. The great mission of the Christ was to give people the first impulse of love in the spiritual sense. And the disciple whom he himself initiated was, of course, the closest to understanding and recognizing this. He could entrust his deepest secret to him. Until then, only blood ties had united people. Now a spiritual bond was to be established that would connect soul with soul just as intimately and closely as the blood tie between mother and son. In the words that the Christ spoke from the cross to his mother: “Mother, behold your son,” and to the disciple: “Behold your mother,” he established a completely new relationship between people. The whole future of earthly love speaks from the cross at this moment. This was the great brotherly love of men, the bond of universal brotherhood, which was established here as a model for the future development of the earth. It was a spiritual relationship between a mother in spirit and a son in spirit; and in the words spoken from the cross at this moment lies the whole future of love. John had to write these words down so that people could understand the great impulse that the Christ has given them.
Jesus could not tell his disciples everything at the time. “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.
But the spirit should reveal what lies in the seed buried in the earth, what springs forth from the night of death; and then it will be understood what lies hidden in the soul of man.
Around the year 3101 BC, as we already know, the old clairvoyance had slowly begun to fade in individuals; and the spiritual world had become increasingly inaccessible to them. However, as clairvoyance disappeared, self-awareness had been developed to the same extent – and by the time of Jesus it had reached full development. But in order to maintain it, Christ's message was necessary, that the Kingdom of Heaven had come.
But the time of Kali-Yuga, the dark age of humanity, which began in 3101 BC, ended in 1899. And in our time we are facing a different development. New soul powers are to be developed in people, and in 1932 to 1933 the time will come when certain clairvoyant powers will arise almost automatically from the depths of the soul in a larger number of people. But in order to prevent dismay and confusion from spreading too much during this time, it is necessary that there are guides who can tell people what to do with these new powers. For only the spiritually prepared know what to seek. Only they know and recognize that there is a spiritual world.
Through occult training, a person can already now get spiritual eyes and can then see the spiritual being of Christ in the astral atmosphere of the earth, because these words are true: “I am close to you every day until the end of the world.” But at a certain point in time, a large number of people will be able to see into the spiritual world in a natural way. And if they are not taught by spiritually prepared people, they can easily be driven to madness by fear and terror because they do not know and understand what they are seeing. [When they are told, when they will know that there is a spiritual world, they will be able to recognize it and create harmony. What will appear to the spiritual eyes in the astral sphere of the earth for a number of people is the spiritual appearance of Christ. This is what is called the return of Christ.
Just as Christ once walked on earth in a physical body and was seen by a number of people with their physical eyes, so in the next period he will be visible to all people in the astral world. This era will last approximately five hundred years from 1899 to 2500. During this time, people will begin to ascend to the spiritual world, where he is, and all eyes will be opened so that humanity in its entirety will understand and recognize who the Christ is.
But we must start preparing people for this great moment now. Just as John the Baptist was to prepare people for the coming of Christ on Earth in his time, so Theosophy must help people in our day to face the times that lie ahead. For the time is near when people shall receive the strength to realize the Kingdom of Christ here on Earth. If we embrace our mission in this spirit, Theosophy will spread more and more peace and tolerance in the world. And when the ability to see the Christ becomes more common, other abilities will also arise. Then the great helpers of the Christ will gradually emerge again. First of all, the great Buddha, who was the first to spread the teaching of compassion and love. After him come the messengers of the Great Lodge, the twelve leaders of Earth's evolution, who see in the Christ the thirteenth and most noble, around whom they gather. Other teachers have preceded them to prepare men, and after them others will come to explain clearly the great mission of the Christ.
Those who have venerated Buddha in one incarnation will understand in the following incarnation that Buddha pointed to the Christ. What Buddha himself said six hundred years before Christ is not the same as what he has to say in our days. Each of these teachings is meant to say its word about the great Christ impulse. All religions have their roots, but all religions also have their development. And all have had the same message for humanity. Thus Zarathustra, thus the Old Testament, thus also the Chaldean-Egyptian records, thus also theosophy in our days. We are to accept all these messengers from heaven so that the great wisdom teaching can develop in the most diverse ways. The great initiates were all in agreement, for they knew that each had his contribution to make and that all these contributions were to flow together. So also each Rishi had his special mission, but what the seven Rishis proclaimed each for himself melted into one great message to mankind.
But what was meant to sound harmonious, men changed into disharmony. The sons of the gods had brought to men what they each had to give them. But among them there were some who joined with human egoism to disturb the harmony. And so the disharmony grew greater and greater. This happened when the sons of the gods took a liking to the daughters of men. In other words, when divine wisdom descended to earth and united with human selfishness. We must approach the truth and develop through love.
Not only souls, but also worldviews must love each other. The Christ has given the impulse for the great brotherhood that will unite all people and all religions. When human wisdom has been sacrificed for divine wisdom, we will rediscover the daughters of the gods, spiritual wisdom. Then the sons of men will rise to the daughters of the gods. And with that, the other half of the Earth's evolution begins. The Christ impulse is the great unifying and harmonizing force that we must allow to work on our soul life. We must allow this impulse to work not only on our minds but also on our feelings, and then we will feel the infinite warmth that flows towards us, then we will sense how even the dead letter has the power to convey to us the impulse that has poured out from Golgotha over the whole world to lead humanity ever higher and higher.
Through theosophy and spiritual science, people should understand the Gospels better and better. And the deeper we penetrate into them, the more warmth will flow to us from there. Not theory, but feeling is the essential thing. But it is vain to preach love if people do not receive wisdom through spiritual science, for without wisdom no one can come to love. As in the beginning of time the Sons of God descended and united with the daughters of the earth, so in the end of time the Sons of Man shall find the Sons of God and ascend to them.
[The ascent will then appear as the second half of the Earth mission. The Gospel of John has the power to convey the impulse of Christ directly to us. The more we will be aglow with that fire in the spirit of which Christ spoke, the more we will read the Gospel of John.
Source: The Rudolf Steiner Archive
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