The Zodiac: The forming of the human being through cosmic influences

Rudolf Steiner, Dornach, Switzerland, October 28, 1921:

Today we shall study the human being in regard to his form, and from this standpoint widen and deepen what we have recently considered. If we envisage, to begin with, the fact that the human form, of course, depends in the widest sense on the whole life of man, we should then consider first of all man's life as a whole, in order to grasp the human form from within, in a concrete way. To begin with, the human being forms part of the whole universe, of the whole cosmos. And if you bear in mind that in regard to the formation of the head, the human being is in reality an image of the sphere, of the cosmic universe, you will find, as it were, that as regards the head, he is placed into the whole universe. But we can only understand the way in which he is placed into it, and is at the same time a self-contained being, by bearing in mind man's connection with the whole environing world.

Let us first consider the human form by saying: With his whole thinking, insofar as it is connected with the head, man turns toward the whole cosmos, and by bringing his head, through birth, from the spiritual world into physical existence, the human being, enclosed within his body, may in a certain way look back upon his real, inner soul-spiritual being as it existed during the time when he was not enclosed within a body. Perhaps we obtain the best picture of what I mean by this when we consider how the human being attains knowledge by looking back, as it were, into his own self. For when we occupy ourselves with arithmetic and geometry, we look back into ourselves. We recognize the laws of geometry simply because we are human beings able to draw the spatial laws out of our own being. But on the other hand, we know that these laws fill out the whole universe. Consequently, when we look out into the world we have something which we necessarily perceive through the eyes; but everything is arranged geometrically, also the eyes, which are focused geometrically. We may therefore say: insofar as man faces the world with his thinking that is connected with his head, he takes back, as it were, into himself what is spread out in the universe. Let us therefore imagine this first stage of fitting himself into the cosmos by saying: man takes in the universe, he looks back upon the universe, as it were. By looking back upon ourselves, we discover the universe.

This is man's most external connection with the universe out of which he is built.

We proceed further by envisaging in the second place how the human being activates within him what he takes in from outside. Consider that when the child is born, everything which it experienced from death to a new birth lives within its being; if the child could develop a consciousness in this direction, it would be able to look back on the experiences which it had before birth. But these prenatal experiences then begin to be active in the child. The human being does not only look back into his own self in order to discover the universe anew within himself, but he also looks out into the environing world. He sees the world that surrounds him. We may therefore say: He does not only take in the universe, but he looks out into the universe around him and takes in the mobility of the universe. He grows inwardly mobile.

You only need to clasp your left hand consciously with your right one — you only need to touch yourself — in order to remain completely within yourself. You do something with your right hand, but you are taking hold of something which is your own self. You now touch yourself in the same way in which you feel about and touch an external object. Every perception of the ego, of one's inner being, is really based upon this: To take hold of one's own self. We also do it indirectly with the eyes. When we envisage any point outside, the axis of the right eye crosses that of the left eye in the same way in which our hands cross when the right hand clasps the left one. Animals have less inner life because they touch themselves much less. We may therefore say that the third thing is: To experience or touch ourselves. In reality, we are still in the external world when we thus grasp ourselves. We are not yet within our skin.

But let us now envisage the boundary between the outer and inner life. Let us indicate this process by moving the right hand, clasping the left one, up and down, so as to describe a surface. This surface is everywhere on ourselves. With our body's covering sheath we enclose our inner being. We may therefore say that the fourth thing is to encompass ourselves.

If you penetrate in a living way through feeling into your form, insofar as it is enclosed by the skin, you will obtain this process of encompassing yourself.

First:	We take in the universe and look back.
Second:	We look out into the universe. We take in its mobility.
Third:	We grasp ourselves. (Touch ourselves.)
Fourth:	We encompass ourselves.

These four things place before us the gradual process of man's formation from outside toward inside. We have, to begin with, the whole universe; but we are still outside. Then the imitation of the universe; but we have not yet reached our own being, for we imitate the universe. If we touch ourselves, we reach ourselves from outside. Only in the fourth stage do we encompass ourselves.

In the fifth stage we must seek something which is inside, which fills us out, surging and weaving through us. We may therefore say: Five: That which fills us out, surging and weaving through us.

Then comes the sixth stage: Through the fact that we do not only have a skin, but that it is filled out, and through the fact that we were thus able to penetrate into our own being, a process begins which dissolves the form, devolving it into something which not only fills out the human being inwardly, but makes him like a fruit that has ripened. Let us follow the fruit's development to the point where it is just ripening; if it surpasses this point, it dries up. We may therefore say: Six: Ripening.

Imagine this ripening process. By growing mature we begin, as it were, to decay inwardly. In a very small measure we cease to become human beings. Although we are human beings, we become inwardly dust, so to speak. We grow mineralized. With this we again fit ourselves into the external world. We are completely within our being, with that body which fills us out. Then, when we become dust inwardly, we again fit ourselves into the mineral world. We become, as it were, a body which has weight. We may therefore say: Seven: We fit ourselves into the inorganic world.

I have once described to you that when we weigh a human being, he stands there like a mineral. This led us to the point of being able to say that he fits himself into the inorganic world. We might also say: He fits himself into the external forces of nature.

Eight: At this stage we not only fit ourselves into the external world, but we take in the external world. We breathe, we eat, we absorb the external world. In a preceding stage we merely developed within us forces which already existed within us; this stage of development consisted essentially of this. Then comes our inner life, but there we take into ourselves the external world. When we reach this moment we should, above all, realize quite clearly that everything a human being takes in from outside is like something which should not really form part of him. There are many erroneous conceptions in the world regarding this process of absorbing substances and forces from outside. In reality, everything we eat is a tiny bit poisonous. For life consists in taking in nourishment and our not allowing it to become completely one with us: we offer resistance, and life really consists in this resistance, this defense. But of course the substances which we take in as nourishment are so slightly poisonous that we are able to offer resistance. For if we take a real poison it destroys us, because we are unable to defend ourselves against it.

We may therefore say: When the external world penetrates into us, a kind of poisonous sting enters into us. We must use strong expressions which do not exist in ordinary speech and ordinary knowledge. When I explain these things to you, you must therefore try to grasp what I really mean.

Five:	That which fills us out.
Six:	Ripening.
Seven:	Fitting ourselves into the inorganic world and seeking the balance.
Eight:	Poisonous sting.

This brings us to the point of absorbing what is outside. Consequently we began with the forming of man out of the universe, proceeded to the forming of man from within, and arrived at the point where his inner life develops by offering resistance to the external world.

But the human being forms himself (at least his life, and to some extent also his real form) in accordance with his external attitude, his external activities. But in the present time our activities no longer have a real connection with the human being; we must go back into earlier times if we wish to grasp man in his real connection with his environment, in which he participates in the world's processes. At this point we may say: The ninth stage represents one of man's activities. He participates in the external world by taking his place culturally in the external life on Earth. He is, to begin with, a hunter. Nine: Hunter.

He then progresses in his activities. He becomes a breeder of animals. This is the next stage. Ten: A breeder of animals. Eleven: He becomes a farmer; that is the next stage of perfection. And finally, Twelve: He becomes a trader. Later on you will see that I do not include the activities which followed. They are of secondary nature. Man's primary occupations are: hunter, breeder of animals, farmer, and trader. This characterizes man in regard to his form and the way he lives upon the Earth as a hunter, breeder of animals, farmer, or trader. These are forms of human activities, of human occupations, upon the Earth.

Nine:	Hunter.
Ten:	Breeder of animals.
Eleven:	Farmer.
Twelve:	Trader.

The following drawing [The drawing, showing the Earth in the universe, cannot be reproduced.] might be made, as an illustration for the schematic table. Let us say, to begin with, that here we have the Earth. Let us suppose that we have the human being upon the Earth. In regard to these four form principles, he would be dependent on the Earth's circumference; that is to say, he would be formed from out the Earth's circumference. Here (above), man is formed from within. Let us leave this aside for the moment, and consider how the human being is formed by the Earth, as a hunter, or breeder of animals; the result would be the very opposite. For example, if here, at this point, we have the influence of the constellations — that is to say, an influence coming from the circumference — then the constellations below the horizon (for the Earth covers them) would be able to influence man only by sending their influence through the Earth. Here the human being would have to adapt himself to the Earth in regard to his stars. And what lies in the middle would offer him the possibility to develop himself inwardly.

We may therefore say: the four upper members of man's formation lead him out into the universe; the last four members lead him to the Earth, and the stars come into consideration insofar as they are covered by the Earth; in the four central members the stars and the earth maintain a balance: man dwells in his inner being.

You see, even in ancient times these things were felt, and people said that a certain portion of the starry sky influenced man so as to form him from outside, from the universe. Of course, one had to accept different stars according to the seasons. The constellations change. But let us take, on a large scale, the epoch in which we are living. If we adopt the standpoint of a Greek reflecting over such things, we might say: The stars in the proximity of Aries send their influence from outside; also those in the proximity of Taurus; and similarly the stars near Gemini and near Cancer. These constellations — Aries, Taurus, Gemini, and Cancer — enable man to look back, to be inwardly mobile, to take hold of himself and to encompass himself.

The other stars, on the opposite side below, which are covered by the Earth, enable man to be a hunter through the influence of Sagittarius. He is able to live as a breeder of animals by taming the goat: Capricorn. He is able to live as a farmer, by — well, let us first take the simplest farming existence — by pouring out water, by walking over the fields with urns and pouring out water: Aquarius. And he becomes a trader through the influence of a star region holding that which carries him over the sea. For in ancient times every ship had the form of a fish. And two ships sailing side by side, traveling as trading vessels over the sea, are really the symbol of trade. So that by designating a ship as a “fish,” we would obtain here, as a twelfth sign: Pisces.

In the middle we have what lies in between, filling out man; that is to say, the influence of the blood, which fills the human being. How may this blood, contained in man, best be symbolized? Perhaps by taking the animal with the most intensive heart activity: the lion, Leo.

The maturing process — ripening: it suffices to look at the fields, at the ripening wheat or corn: the ear of corn represents the condition in which the fruit reaches the stage of maturity: it is the Virgin with the sheaf: Virgo. The chief thing here is the sheaf.

And if we consider the moment when man once more fits himself into the external world, or in other words, seeks to establish the balance, we have Libra. And where he feels the poisonous sting, where he feels that everything is slightly poisonous: Scorpio.

Man's Formation Out of the Universe. Head	He takes in the Universe and looks back. He looks out into the Universe. He takes in the mobility of the Universe. He grasps himself (touches himself). He encompasses himself.	Aries Taurus Gemini Cancer
Man's Formation from Within. Thorax	What fills him out. Maturity He fits himself into the inorganic world and seeks balance. Poisonous sting	Leo Virgo with the Sheaf Libra Scorpio
The Formation of Man's Activities on Earth. The Extremities of Earth Man.	Hunter Breeder or Tamer of Animals. Farmer Trader	Sagittarius Capricorn Aquarius Pisces

During past epochs, people really experienced man's connection with the universe and with the Earth; but modern people are no longer able to interpret such things. They say: Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, and draw the corresponding signs, but in reality they do not have the slightest idea of what these things really mean. For it is necessary to consider them in the right way. If you look at an old picture of Aries you will see that this is not a materialistic or naturalistic reproduction; its characteristic trait is that Aries is always looking back; this gesture of Aries looking back is the essential thing in the picture. We have this gesture of Aries in the human being who is looking back on himself, on the universe that lives in him. Aries should therefore not be viewed merely in a naturalistic-materialistic way. The picture reproducing Aries, the sign for Aries, is not materialistic or naturalistic, but its essential characteristic lies in the gesture of looking back.

If you look at old pictures of Taurus you will find that he is always looking sideways and jumping. Also in this case the gesture is the essential thing, the gesture of looking around and activating the universal principle that lives within. Here, too, the gesture is the chief thing.

And if you look at Gemini you will be confronted by one man on the right and another on the left, yet they are always depicted in such a way that the right hand of the man on the right is clasping the left hand of the man on the left. Again, it is the gesture which should be considered. It expresses the fact that man is touching himself, feeling himself. The right and left side of man are set forth as independent beings, because in a certain way man is still outside and takes in his prenatal being by touching or feeling himself.

Cancer is the self-encompassed being, closed to the external world. Modern people also view the sign of Cancer materialistically, naturalistically. But to the people who took Cancer as the symbol for encompassing oneself, the chief thing was that Cancer, the crab, can put its claws round its victim, thus encompassing it. This is contained in the word Cancer, which encompasses man. Cancer is the encompassing element. It is really the symbol of the human being who closes himself within his own self, who does not only touch or feel himself, but who closes himself from outside within his inner being.

Leo, with the strongly developed heart system, is the true “heart animal.” The lion may be considered as the “heart animal.” The lion's qualities set forth the fifth member which should be borne in mind.

On the stage of maturity, we find Virgo, the virgin with the sheaf, and the essential thing is the sheaf, in which the fruit is on the verge of drying up. And Libra, the scales, expresses that we seek to establish the balance. Scorpio is, of course, the poisonous sting. And Sagittarius is in reality an animal form ending in a human being armed with bow and arrow. The Zodiac sign for Sagittarius is a human being sitting like a centaur upon an animal's body. It symbolizes the hunter.

Capricorn is really a goat ending in a fish tail — something which we do not find in nature. For a goat with a fish tail does not exist. But man, the breeder of animals, makes wild beasts as tame as fishes. This is consequently an artificial symbol. Aquarius stands for agriculture. In this sign people, of course, see water and so forth, and this is spiritually justified. But in this Zodiac sign you will always find a striding character: A man striding along with two urns and pouring water out of them. He is watering the earth and is therefore a gardener, a farmer. Pisces, the fishes, is a sign which I have already explained; it symbolizes trade, for in the past the ships were adorned with the heads of fishes, for example of dolphins — even though dolphins are not fishes — but the ancients thought that they were fishes. This symbol therefore indicates the character of trading.

We should not consider things schematically or superficially, as is so frequently the case today, but we should set out from this development of the human form, and from there endeavor to grasp man's connection with the universe and with the Earth. This will gradually reveal the human being, from the aspect of his form, as a member, a part, of the whole cosmos.

Let us now consider the question from the following aspect. If, to begin with, we take everything from the standpoint of the ancient Greeks — Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Aquarius, Pisces — we may say, when looking upon the human form: In regard to the shape of the head (consider everything I have already explained to you) the human being is formed from outside, from the cosmos. Then forces begin to work inside. They give man the possibility to become symmetrical. But in regard to the influence of the last groups of stars, we must reverse everything. The human being is also subjected to the influence of the Earth. He is influenced by forces. If this is indicated more thickly on the drawing, we may draw the other forces more thinly on the other side and say: If a human being particularly unfolds all that corresponds to Sagittarius, shown here (you know that this is the Zodiac sign of the upper thighs), he will have especially strong upper thighs and be a hunter. If he is a breeder of animals he must often bend his knees. If he is a farmer he must walk and is therefore depicted as a striding man, etc. And in regard to trading: if we look for a symbol connected with the human being himself, we come across the feet. These, in any case, are formed from outside.

In the middle we find the region where man forms himself. If I draw this form, it results spontaneously from the twelve Zodiac signs. We may therefore say: Here (in the middle), the universe or the stars send their influences more into man's inner being. Here (above), they influence him from outside, and here (below), they compress him. But you will recognize in this drawing the shape of the human embryo. When you draw the human embryo, you must draw it in this way, if you include the Zodiac; it can only be drawn in this way, in accordance with its own laws. When you draw a figure encompassing an angle of 180 degrees, you obtain a triangle. When you draw the Zodiac, transforming it so that it reveals its laws in regard to the Earth, you obtain through inner laws the shape of the human embryo. This would constitute a direct proof that the human embryo is formed out of the whole universe, that it is the product of the cosmos.

I told you just now that we should adopt the standpoint of the Greeks, but today we can no longer set out from Aries; we must set out from the sign of Pisces. We now have lived for many centuries under the sign of Pisces. It is the sign which marks man's transition to intellectualism. But if you go back to the point where it was still justified to set out from Aries and it was possible to speak of the Zodiac in the old meaning, you will not obtain more than the callings represented by Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, and Pisces; namely, hunter, breeder of animals, farmer, and trader. Everything connected with industrialism, etc., already pertains to the epoch of Pisces, and it is a repetition.

Consider the following: We now live in the age of Pisces. During this age developed everything which constitutes the present civilization of machines. But if we go back to the epoch of Aries, we still find the four honest callings, and although they had already become more complicated and modified, they placed man into nature. And by going back still farther, to the epoch of Taurus, to the third, second, first post-Atlantean ages, to the last Atlantean epoch, and to the last but one Atlantean epoch, etc., we would finally come to Pisces. There we would find that man was a completely etheric being and that he had not yet come down to the physical world. In the age of Pisces we find that he was an etheric being, and in the present time he is really repeating what he already passed through at that time, when he developed into a human being. Since the middle of the fifteenth century he is repeating this stage, but in an abstract way. In the past he grew concretely into his human development. Since the middle of the fifteenth century he is growing into his abstractions, for a machine is also an abstraction. Since the return of the age of Pisces, man has really sailed into the forces which dissolve him. And when he will reach Aquarius, this dissolution will have progressed in an essential way; he will then above all be unable to have the slightest connection with the universe unless he clings to the spiritual world. Just because of this repetition, man must penetrate into the spiritual world.

This also shows you that in reality man is a threefold being: he is formed out of the cosmos insofar as he has a head; he develops within his own self and is only in correspondence with the external world insofar as he has a thorax; he develops his extremities and his metabolic processes by inserting himself into the earthly sphere.

Also from another aspect we have before us a threefold being. Consider that when the human being reaches birth, the first four force-impulses lie within him; he unfolds them, but even then he is in a certain sense a complete human being, except that the other eight members are still in a rudimentary stage. The head is a complete human being; the other members, attached to it, are rudimentary. The thorax, too, is a complete human being, but the first four force-impulses and the last four are rudimentary. Also the limbs form a complete human being, but the thorax and the head attached to it are rudimentary. Three human beings are thus contained in man. The first one, the head, is in reality the transformation of the preceding incarnation. The thorax man is in reality the present incarnation as such. And what the human being does, the way in which he is active in the external world, particularly what comes to expression in his limbs and in his metabolic processes, carry him across into the next incarnation. Man is therefore a threefold being also in this connection. The human form may thus be studied as a complete whole.

We should really say: If we wish to make a drawing of the human being we should have to draw his head. We then have before us a complete human being. You will gather this from the following fact: In the lower jaw you really have the legs, except that there they are turned backwards and the head is sitting on its legs. The head is a complete human being, but its legs are reversed; they form the lower jaw and man is sitting on it, so that here I can draw a complete human being in a sitting posture.

Also the thorax is a complete human being. The arms are, as it were, the external representatives of etheric eyes. And again, the limbs are a complete human being. There, for example, the kidneys would be the eyes. Also in regard to the human form we thus have three human beings which are linked together. They interpenetrate in such a way that the human being that has hidden itself into the head, which has become a sphere, reveals to us what penetrated into the present life from the preceding incarnation; the human being in the thorax is really the human being of the present incarnation; and the human being running about is the one that penetrates into the next incarnation.

But in a certain sense we may say: Also man's whole attitude in the present reveals this threefold character. Take the limbs and the metabolic processes. In regard to these, man is able to produce a complete human being. You only need to consider the human germ, the human embryo in the mother's body, in order to obtain metabolic man with his limbs, seeking to become a complete human being. Take thoracic man and observe how the head and the thorax still form a whole in the child, during its infancy. This threefold aspect thus appears also in the growing human being.

When man outgrows infancy, he must be educated. The human being living in the head is the educator and educates the other human being — the childish head teaches the child (“Kindskopf den Kindskopf”) — for in reality the human being always remains a child in regard to his head. He only grows old, that is to say, middle-aged, in regard to the middle part, the thoracic man, and quite old in regard to the metabolic-limb man. People notice this, as they grow old. Even in accordance with the old riddle “When young, it walks on four legs; in middle age on two, and in old age on three,” people notice that they grow old in this connection. Also in regard to his head, man always remains, as it were, the result of his past incarnation. The head really remains a child throughout life. Indeed, we may say: The science of education should try to solve the problem of how the childish head, which is the teacher, should treat the childish pupil in the right way.

These things are apparently humoristic, but they conceal a deep truth which should be borne in mind in order to obtain a correct view concerning man.

Consider that in reality man's head is the passenger conveyed by the remaining human being — a passenger who is a spy. The head's legs are always in a sitting posture, the head does not even attempt to walk independently. It is always being carried, like a man traveling by coach. In reality, the head is the passenger in man.

Thoracic man is instead the human being's nurse. And limb-man is the worker, who is employed as a slave, for it is really he who is passing through life. We are head, as far as Cancer. We have this from heaven, without any cooperation on our part. Here (in the center) we must breathe and eat; this is our nurse. And the real worker belongs to the sphere of Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, and Pisces.

You see, this enables us to obtain man's form in its connection with the whole universe. It is only necessary to take things quite earnestly, even if they are set before you more lightly and not pedantically. They will show you that everything I have explained to you today contains, on the one hand, the possibility to grasp the human form out of the whole cosmos, but on the other hand lies what may fill us, I might say, with great reverence for the primeval wisdom of men who were able to place into their Zodiac symbols such a tremendously significant science of Man, drawn out of their instinctive clairvoyance. Today we have instead a science in which people stare at Aries without knowing that its characteristic lies in the fact that it turns backwards; that the characteristic of Gemini lies in the fact that they touch each other, clasp hands, and so forth. Everything in the Zodiac symbols is immensely profound, deeply significant — each gesture, every single sign. And when the gesture itself is not the essential thing, as in Leo, then the symbol is chosen in such a way that the sign itself, I might say, expresses the gesture; the Lion is chosen, because he has the strongest heart pulsation. The Lion is the representative of the forces which fill out the human being.

In this way it is possible to draw to the surface again the primeval wisdom of the ages, by finding it within ourselves.

Source: http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/Dates/19211028p01.html

To Darlene, my One and Only

"She wasn't doing a thing that I could see, except standing there, leaning on the balcony railing, holding the universe together."  — J. D. Salinger

At-one-ment 

Washed in the Blood of the Lamb are We

Awash in a Sunburst Sea

You—Love—and I—Love—and Love Divine:

We are the Trinity

You—Love—and I—We are One-Two-Three

Twining Eternally

Two—Yes—and One—Yes—and also Three:

One Dual Trinity

Radiant Calvary

Ultimate Mystery

Acanemia: Parched, dried-up little professors

"Be admonished: of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh."  — Ecclesiastes 12:12

Rudolf Steiner:

As human beings we really live, as it were, throughout the day in a kind of autumn and winter mood. Indeed, the soul's summer mood only exists when the soul is asleep, and the sleeping human body, the physical and the etheric body, is like a plant. And the I and astral body outside shed their rays upon the physical and etheric body like the Sun and the stars, and they call into life again the forces destroyed during the day; vegetable life begins to grow. And the day's thinking activity exists in order to eliminate what the night calls forth as growing life.

When we wake up, we lightly pass over our whole plantlike existence, just like autumn over the plants of the Earth. And when we are awake during the day, we do what winter does to the vegetation of the Earth by destroying in our physical and etheric body the budding, growing life produced at night in the soul's summer time when we are asleep. From this standpoint, it can easily be grasped why people who do not bring at least something of their soul's summer into their waking daytime life dry up so easily. Parched, dried-up little professors are people who do not like to absorb things which are not fully conscious. They do not like to take in anything of the soul's summer seasons. Consequently they dry up; they acquire a pronounced winter character.

May we be centered in compassionate love

Rudolf Steiner, "Verse for America"

May we be centered in the feeling

of compassionate love in our hearts

as we seek to unite with human beings who share our goals

and with spirit beings who, full of grace,

look downward on our earnest, heartfelt striving,

strengthening us from realms of light

and illuminating our love.

Spirit Triumphant!

"Spirit Triumphant! Flame through the weakness of faltering, fainthearted souls! Burn up egoism, kindle compassion, so that selflessness, the lifestream of humanity, may flow as the wellspring of spiritual rebirth!" — Rudolf Steiner

Sieghafter Geist
Durchflamme die Ohnmacht
Zaghafter Seelen.
Verbrenne die Ichsucht,
Entzünde das Mitleid,
Daß Selbstlosigkeit,
Der Lebensstrom der Menschheit,
Wallt als Quelle
Der geistigen Wiedergeburt.

Rejoice!

"Rejoice in the Lord always: and again I say, Rejoice."
— Philippians 4:4

"You should be leading lives of joy — deep inner joy in the truth! There is nothing in the world more delightful, nothing more fascinating, than the experience of truth."  — Rudolf Steiner

Life is an open book — read it and weep for joy

"To what avail is all expenditure and labor of suns and planets and moons, of stars and galaxies, of comets and of nebulae, and of completed and still growing worlds, if not at last a happy man rejoices in his existence?”  — Goethe

"This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it."
— Psalm 118:24

Once when we were passing each other Swamiji planted himself in front of me and said "You should be happier." I replied "I'm sure you're right, Swamiji. Almost everyone—" Swamiji cut me off: "No! No! YOU should be happier!"

Anthroposophy: the redemption of man through the redemption of thinking

Rudolf Steiner, Dornach, Switzerland, January 26, 1923

In my last lectures I spoke of man's fall into sin and of an ascent from sin. I spoke of this ascent as something that must arise in the present age from human consciousness in general, as a kind of ideal for man's striving and willing. I have pointed out the more formal aspect of the fall of man, as it appears in the present time, by showing how the fall of man influences intellectual life. What people say concerning the limitations of our knowledge of Nature really arises from the view that man has no inner strength enabling him to reach the spiritual, and that he must therefore renounce all efforts that might lift him above earthly contemplation. I said that when people speak today of the limits of knowledge, this is only the modern intellectual interpretation of how man was cast down into sin; this was felt in older times, and particularly during the Middle Ages. Today I should like to speak more from a material aspect, in order to show that modern humanity cannot reach the goal of the evolution of the Earth if the views acquired in a more recent age — especially in the course of an intellectual development — do not change. Through the consciousness of sin, the general consciousness of today has, to a certain extent, suffered this very fall of man. Modern intellectualism already bears the marks of this fall and decay; indeed, the decay is so strong that unless the intellectual civilization of the present time changes, there is no hope of attaining mankind's goal in the evolution of the Earth. Today it is necessary to know that, in the depths of the human soul, forces are living that are, as it were, better than the present state of the consciousness of our civilization. It is necessary to contemplate quite clearly the nature of the consciousness of our civilization.

The consciousness of our civilization arose, on the one hand, from a particular conception of the thinking human being, and, on the other hand, from a particular conception of the willing human being. Today man uses his thinking chiefly in order to know as much as possible of the outer kingdoms of Nature, and to grasp human life with the methods of thinking gained through the usual way of looking at Nature. Today natural science teaches us to think, and we consider social life, too, in the light of this thinking, acquired through the natural sciences as they are known today.

Many people believe that this conception of the thinking human being, of man who observes Nature and thinks, is an unprejudiced conception. All kinds of things are mentioned that science is unprejudiced, and so on. But I have shown repeatedly that these arguments are not of much value. For everything that a thinker applies when he is bent on his scientific investigations (according to which other people then arrange their life) has evolved from earlier ways of thinking. Modern thinking is the direct outcome of Medieval thinking. I have pointed out already that even the arguments of the opponents of Medieval thinking are thought out with the methods of thinking that have evolved from Mediaeval thinking. An essential trait of Medieval thinking which entered modern thinking is that the activity of thought is contemplated only in the form in which it is applied in the observation of the outer phenomena of Nature. The process of thinking is ignored altogether and there is no philosophy leading to the contemplation of thinking itself. No notice at all is taken of the process of thought and of its inner living force.

The reason for this lies in the considerations that I have already set forth. Once I said that a modern man's thoughts on Nature are really corpses: all our thoughts on the kingdoms of Nature are dead thoughts. The life of these thought corpses lies in man's pre-earthly existence. The thoughts that we form today on the kingdoms of Nature and on the life of man are dead while we are thinking them; they were endowed with life in our pre-earthly existence.

The abstract, lifeless thoughts that we form here on Earth in accordance with modern habits of thinking were alive, were living elementary beings, during our pre-earthly existence, before we descended to a physical incarnation on Earth. We lived then in these thoughts as living beings, just as today we live in our blood. During our life on Earth these thoughts are dead, and for this reason they are abstract. But our thinking is dead only as long as we apply it to Nature outside: as soon as we look into our own selves it appears to us as something living, for it continues working there, within us, in a way which remains concealed from the usual consciousness of today. There it continues to elaborate what existed during our pre-earthly life. The forces that seize our organism when we incarnate on Earth are the forces of these living thoughts. The force of these living, pre-earthly thoughts makes us grow and forms our organs. Thus, when the philosophers of a theory of knowledge speak of thinking, they speak of a lifeless thinking. Were they to speak of the true nature of thinking, not of its corpse, they would realize the necessity of considering man's inner life. There they would discover that the force of thinking, which becomes active when a human being is born or conceived, is not complete in itself and independent, because this inner activity of thought is the continuation of the living force of a pre-earthly thinking.

Even when we observe the tiny child (I will not now consider the embryo in the mother's body) and its dreamy, slumbering life on Earth, we can see the living force of pre-earthly thinking in its growth and even in its fretful tempers, provided we have eyes to see. Then we shall understand why the child slumbers dreamily and only begins to think later on. This is so, because in the beginning of its life, when the child does nothing but sleep and dream, thoughts take hold of its entire organism. When the organism gradually grows firmer and harder, the thoughts no longer seize the earthly and watery elements in the organism, but only the air element and the fire or warmth element. Thus we may say that in the tiny child, thought takes possession of all four elements. The later development of a child consists in this: that thought takes hold only of the elements of air and fire. When an adult thinks, his force of thinking is contained only in the continuation of the breathing process and of the process which spreads warmth throughout his body.

Thus the force of thinking abandons the firmer parts of the physical organism for the air-like, evanescent, imponderable parts of the body. Thus thinking became the independent element that it now is, and bears us through the life between birth and death. The continuation of the pre-earthly force of thinking asserts itself only when we are asleep, i.e. when the weaker force of thinking acquired on Earth no longer works in the warmth and air of the body. Thus we may say that modern man will understand something of the true nature of thinking only if he really advances toward an inner contemplation of man, of himself. Any other theory of knowledge is quite abstract.

If we bear this in mind rightly we must say that whenever we contemplate the activity that forms thoughts and ideas, our gaze opens out into pre-earthly existence.

Medieval thinking, still possessing a certain amount of strength, was not allowed to enter pre-earthly existence. Man's pre-existence was declared dogmatically as a heresy. Something that is forced upon mankind for centuries gradually becomes a habit. Think of the more recent evolution of humanity — take, for instance, the year 1413; people habitually refrained from allowing their thoughts to follow lines that might lead them to a pre-earthly existence, because they were not allowed to think of pre-earthly existence. People entirely lost the habit of directing their thoughts to a pre-earthly existence. If men had been allowed to think of pre-earthly life (they were forbidden this, up to 1413), evolution would have taken quite another direction. In this case we should very probably have seen — this is a paradox, but it is true — indeed we may say that undoubtedly we should have seen that when Darwinism arose in 1858, with its exterior theories on Nature's evolution, the thought of pre-earthly existence would have flashed up from all the kingdoms of Nature, as the result of a habit of thinking that took into consideration a pre-earthly existence. In the light of the knowledge of human pre-existence, another kind of natural science would have arisen. But men were no longer accustomed to consider pre-earthly life, and a science of Nature arose which considered man — as I have often set forth — as the last link in the chain of animal evolution. It could not reach a pre-earthly, individual life, because the animal has no pre-earthly, individual life.

Therefore we can say: When the intellectual age began to dawn, the old conception of the fall of mankind was responsible for the veto on all thoughts concerning pre-existence. Then science arose as the immediate offspring of this misunderstood fall of man. Our science is sinful — it is the direct outcome of the misunderstanding relating to the fall of man. This implies that the Earth cannot reach the goal of its evolution as long as the natural sciences remain as they are; man would develop a consciousness that is not born of his union with a divine-spiritual origin, but of his separation from this divine-spiritual origin.

Hence present-day talk of the limitations of knowledge is not only a theoretical fact, for what is developing under the influence of intellectualism positively shows something that is pushing mankind below its level. Speaking in Medieval terms, we should say that the natural sciences have gone to the devil.

Indeed, history speaks in a very peculiar way. When the natural sciences and their brilliant results arose (I do not mean to contest them today), those who still possessed some feeling for the true nature of man were afraid that natural science might lead them to the devil. The fear of that time — a last remnant of which can be seen in Faust, when he says farewell to the Bible and turns to Nature — consisted in this, that man might approach a knowledge of Nature under the sign of man's fall and not under the sign of an ascent from sin. The root of the matter really lies far deeper than one generally thinks. Whereas in the early Middle Ages there were all kinds of traditions consisting in the fear that the devilish poodle might stick to the heels of the scientist, mankind has now become sleepy, and does not even think of these matters.

This is the material aspect of the question. The view that there are limits to a knowledge of Nature is not only a theory; the fall and decay of mankind, due to its fall in the intellectual-empirical sphere, indeed exists today.

If this were not so, we should not have our modern theory of evolution. Normal methods of research would show, reality would show, the following: There are, let us say, fish, lower mammals, higher mammals, man. Today, this represents more or less the straight line of evolution. But the facts do not show this at all. You will find, along this whole line of evolution, that the facts do not coincide.

Marvels are revealed by a real scientific investigation of Nature; what scientists say about Nature is not true. For, if we consider the facts without any prejudice we obtain the following: Man, higher mammals, lower mammals, fish. (Of course, I am omitting details.) Thus we descend from man to the higher mammals, the lower mammals, etc. until we reach the source of origin of all, where everything is spiritual, and in the further evolution of man we can see that his origin is in the spirit. Gradually man assumed a higher spirituality. The lower beings, also, have their origin in the spirit, but they have not assumed a higher spirituality. Facts show us this.

Man

Higher Mammals

Lower Mammals

Fish

Correct views of these facts could have been gained if human habits of thinking had not obeyed the veto on belief in pre-existence or pre-earthly life. Then, for instance, a mind like Darwin could not possibly have reached the conclusions set forth above; he would have reached other conclusions deriving from habits of thought, not from necessities dictated by scientific investigation.

Goethe's theory of metamorphosis could thus have been continued in a straight line. I have always pointed out to you that Goethe was unable to develop his theory of metamorphosis. If you observe with an unprejudiced mind how matters stood with Goethe, you will find that he was unable to continue. He observed the plant in its development and found the primordial plant (Urpflanze). Then he approached the human being and tried to study the metamorphosis of the human bones. But he came to a standstill and could not go on.

If you peruse Goethe's writings on the morphology of the human bony system you will see that, on the one hand, his ideas are full of genius. The cleft skull of a sheep, which he found on the Lido in Venice, showed him that the skull-bones are transformed vertebrae, but he could not develop his idea further than this.

I have drawn your attention to some notes that I found in the Goethe Archives when I was staying at Weimar. In these notes Goethe says that the entire human brain is a transformed spinal ganglion. Again, he left it at this point. These notes are jotted down in pencil in a notebook and the last pencil-marks plainly show Goethe's discontent and his wish to go further. But scientific research was not advanced enough for this. Today it is advanced enough and has reached long ago the point of facing this problem. When we contemplate the human being, even in his earliest embryonic stages, we find that the form of the present skull-bones cannot possibly have evolved from the vertebrae of the spine. This is quite out of the question. Anyone who knows something of modern embryology argues as follows: what we see in man today does not justify the statement that the skull-bones are transformed vertebrae. For this reason we can indeed say that when Gegenbauer investigated this matter once more at a later date, results proved that as far as the skull-bones and especially the facial bones were concerned, matters stood quite differently from what Goethe had assumed.

But if we know that the present shape of the skull-bones leads us back to the bones of the body of the preceding incarnation, we can understand this metamorphosis. Exterior morphology itself then leads us into the teaching of repeated lives on Earth. This lies in a straight line with Goethe's theory of metamorphosis. But the stream of evolution that finally led to Darwin and still rules official science cannot advance as far as truth. For the misunderstood fall of man has ruined thinking and has caused its decay. The question is far more serious than one is inclined to imagine today.

We must realize that the consciousness of mankind has changed in the course of time. For instance, we may describe something as beautiful. But if we ask a philosopher of today to explain what beauty is (for he should know something about these things, should he not?), we shall receive the most incredibly abstract explanation. “Beautiful” is a word which we sometimes use rightly, instinctively, out of our feeling. But modern man has not the slightest notion of what, for instance, a Greek imagined when he spoke of the beautiful, in his meaning of the word. We do not even know what the Greek meant by “Cosmos.” For him it was something quite concrete. Take our word “Universe.” What a confused jumble of thoughts it contains! When the Greek spoke of the Cosmos, this word held within it something beautiful, decorative, adorning, artistic. The Greek knew that when he spoke of the whole universe he could not do otherwise than characterize it with the idea of beauty. "Cosmos" does not only mean "Universe" — it means Nature's order of laws which has become universal beauty. This lies in the word “Cosmos.”

When the Greek saw before him a beautiful work of art, or when he wished to mould the form of a human being, how did he set to work? By forming it in beauty. Even in Plato's definitions we can feel what the Greek meant when he wished to form the human being artistically. The expression that Plato used means more or less the following: “Here on Earth man is not at all what he should be. He comes from heaven and I have so portrayed his form that men may see in it his heavenly origin.” The Greek imagined man in his beauty, as if he had just descended from heaven, where of course, his exterior form does not resemble that of ordinary human beings. Here on Earth human beings do not look as if they had just descended from heaven. Their form shows everywhere the Cain-mark, the mark of man's fall. This is the Greek conception. In our age, when we have forgotten man's connection with a pre-earthly, heavenly existence, we may not even think of such a thing.

Thus we may say that “beautiful” meant for the Greek that which reveals its heavenly meaning. In this way the idea of beauty becomes concrete. For us today it is abstract. In fact, there has been an interesting dispute between two authorities on aesthetics — the so-called “V” Vischer (because he spelt his name with a “V”), the Swabian Vischer, a very clever man, who wrote an important book on aesthetics (important, in the meaning of our age), and the formalist Robert Zimmermann, who wrote another book on aesthetics. The former, V-Vischer, defines beauty as the manifestation of the idea in sensible form. Zimmermann defines beauty as the concordance of the parts within the whole. He defines it therefore more according to form, Vischer more according to content.

These definitions are really all like the famous personage who drew himself up into the air by his own forelock. What is the meaning of the expression “the appearance of the idea in sensible form?” First we must know what is meant by “the idea.” If the thought-corpse that humanity possesses as “idea” were to appear in physical shape, nothing would appear. But when we ask in the Greek sense: what is a beautiful human being? this does indeed signify something. A beautiful human being is one whose human shape is idealized to such an extent that it resembles a god. This is a beautiful man, in the Greek sense. The Greek definition has a meaning and gives us something concrete.

What really matters is that we should become aware of the change in the content of man's consciousness and in his soul-disposition in the course of time. Modern man believes that the Greek thought just as he thinks now. When people write the history of Greek philosophy — Zeller, for instance, who wrote an excellent history of Greek philosophy (excellent, in the meaning of our present age) — they write of Plato as if he had taught in the 19th century at the Berlin University, like Zeller himself, and not at the Platonic Academy. When we have really grasped this concretely, we see how impossible it is, for obviously Plato could not have taught at the Berlin University in the 19th century. Yet all that tradition relates of Plato is changed into conceptions of the 19th century, and people do not realize that they must transport their whole disposition of soul into an entirely different age if they really wish to understand Plato.

If we acquire for ourselves a consciousness of the development of man's soul-disposition, we shall no longer think it an absurdity to say: In reality, human beings have fallen completely into sin, as far as their thoughts about external Nature and man himself are concerned.

Here we must remember something which people today never bear in mind — indeed, something which they may even look upon as a distorted idea. We must remember that the theoretical knowledge of today, which has become popular and which rules in every head even in the farthest corner of the world and in the remotest villages, contains something that can only be redeemed through the Christ. Christianity must first be understood in this sphere.

If we were to approach a modern scientist, expecting him to understand that his thinking must be saved by the Christ, he would probably put his hands to his head and say: “The deed of Christ may have an influence on a great many things in the world, but we cannot admit that it took place in order to redeem man from the fall into sin on the part of natural science.” Even when theologians write scientific books (there are numerous examples in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, one on ants, another on the brain, etc., and in most cases these books are excellent, better than those of the scientists, because the style is more readable), these books also breathe out, even more strongly, the need of taking a true Christology seriously. This means that particularly in the intellectual sphere we need a true ascent from sin, which must work against man's fall.

Thus we see that intellectualism has been contaminated by what has arisen out of the misunderstandings relating to the consciousness of sin — not out of the Fall as such, but from the misunderstandings with regard to the consciousness of sin. This consciousness of sin, which can be misunderstood so easily, must place the Christ in the center of the evolution of the Earth, as a higher being, and from this point it must find the way out from the Fall. This requires a deeper and more detailed study of human evolution, also in the spiritual sphere.

You see, if we study Medieval scholasticism as it is usually studied today, let us say as far back as Augustine, we shall achieve nothing. Nothing can result, because nothing is seen except that the modern scientific consciousness continues to evolve. The higher things, extending beyond this, are ignored.

In this hall I once tried to give an account of Medieval scholasticism, showing all the connections. I gave a short course of lectures on Thomism and all that is connected with it. But it is a painful fact, and one that is of little help to our anthroposophical movement, that such ideas are not taken up. The relationship between the brilliant scientific conditions of today and the new impulse which must enter science is not sought. If this is not sought, then our scientific laboratories, which have cost so much real sacrifice, will remain unfruitful.

For these, progress would best be achieved by taking up such ideas and by avoiding futile discussions on atomism. In all spheres of fact, modern science has reached a point where it strives to cast aside the mass of sterile thoughts contained in modern scientific literature. Enough is known of the human being, anatomically and physiologically, to reach, by the right methods of thoughts, even such a bold conclusion as that of the metamorphosis of the form of the head from the bodily form of the preceding life. Naturally, if we cling to the material aspect, we shall not reach this point. Then we shall argue, very intelligently, that the bones must in this case remain physical matter, in order that they may undergo a gradual material metamorphosis in the grave! It is important to bear in mind that the material form is an external form and that it is the formative forces that undergo a metamorphosis.

On the one hand thinking has been fettered, because darkness has been thrown over pre-existence. On the other hand, we are concerned with post-existence, or the life after death. Life after death can be understood only with the aid of supersensible knowledge. If supersensible knowledge is rejected, life after death remains an article of faith, accepted purely on the ground of authority. A real understanding of the process of thinking leads to a pre-existent life, provided such thoughts are not forbidden. A knowledge of post-existent life can, however, only be acquired through supersensible knowledge. Here the method described in my Knowledge of the Higher Worlds must be introduced. But this method is rejected by the consciousness of our times.

Thus two influences are at work: on the one hand, the continued effects of the decree prohibiting thought of man's pre-existence; on the other hand, the rejection of supersensible knowledge. If both continue to work, the supersensible world will remain an unexplored region, inaccessible to knowledge, i.e. it will remain an article of faith, and Christianity, too, will remain a matter of faith, not of knowledge. And Science — that which claims the name of “science” — will not allow itself to have anything to do with the Christ. Thus we have our present-day conditions.

At the beginning of today's considerations I said, with regard to the consciousness that is filled today with intellectualism, that humanity has slipped entirely into the consequences of the Fall. If this persists, humanity will be unable to raise itself. This means that it will not reach the goal of the evolution of the Earth. Modern science makes it impossible to reach the goal of the evolution of the Earth. Nevertheless, the depths of the human soul are still untouched: If man appeals to these soul-depths and develops supersensible knowledge in the spirit of the Christ-impulse, he will attain redemption once more, even in the intellectual sphere: redemption from the intellectual forces that have fallen — if I may express it in this way — into sin.

Consequently, the first thing which is needed is to realize that intellectual and empirical scientific research must become permeated with spirituality. But this spirituality cannot reach man as long as the content of space is investigated merely according to its spatial relationships, and the events taking place in the course of time are investigated merely in their chronological sequence.

If you study the shape of the human head, especially with regard to its bony structure, and compare it with the remainder of the skeleton (skull-bones compared to cylindrical bones, vertebrae, and ribs) you will obtain no result whatever. You must go beyond time and space, to conceptions formed in spiritual science, for these grasp the human being as he passes from one earthly life to another. Then you will realize that today we may look upon the human skull-bones as transformed vertebrae. But the vertebrae of the present skeleton of a human being can never change into skull-bones in the sphere of earthly existence. They must first decay and become spiritual, in order to change into skull-bones in the next life on Earth.

An instinctively intuitive mind like Goethe's sees in the skull-bones the metamorphosis of vertebrae. But spiritual science is needed in order to pursue this intuitive vision as far as the domain of facts. Goethe's theory of metamorphosis acquires significance only in the light of spiritual science. For this reason it could not satisfy even Goethe. This is why a knowledge gained through anthroposophical science is the only one that can bring man into a right relationship to the Fall and the re-ascent from sin. For this reason too, anthroposophical ideas are today something which seeks to enter into human evolution not only in the form of thoughts but as the content of life.

Source: http://wn.rsarchive.org/GA/GA0220/19230126p01.html