Esoteric
Lessons for the First Class of the
Free
School for Spiritual Science at the Goetheanum
by Rudolf Steiner
Lesson Fourteen
Translated
by Frank Thomas Smith
Dornach,
May 31, 1924
My
Dear Friends,
We
have been considering the human being's relation to the Guardian of
the Threshold and have led our souls step by step to see what our
relation is to the Guardian of the Threshold on the path of
knowledge. Today we intend to enliven the situation of standing
before the Guardian in order to advance a step further in this
esoteric consideration.
I
will repeat what has been considered in the previous lessons
regarding this situation. Man leaves the physical world in which he
develops his normal consciousness. He realizes that although this
sensible-physical world can be wonderful, joyful as well as painful
and full of suffering,
it
can also be majestic – and that he has every reason to
consciously be a part of it. But he also realizes that he can never
know himself if he merely directs his attention and his feelings to
this physical world. He must say to himself: As wonderful as it is,
with all its amazing variety of colors and forms, what I myself am,
what my origin and being are, cannot be found in the scope of this
environment.
Nevertheless,
from all sides the words resound as the most important task in the
life of the human being: O man, know thyself!
And
it also becomes clear that in normal life we are protected
from
entering
unprepared into the world which is the world of his real being. And
the Guardian of the Threshold is the one who protects us from
consciously perceiving his environment when we are sleeping at night,
for what we would then perceive, unprepared, would be such a terrible
shock that we would not be able to lead a normal human waking life.
The
Guardian of the Threshold also makes it clear to us that he –
the Guardian of the Threshold – is the true, the real gateway
to the spiritual world.
Thus
the person realizes that before he enters the kingdom of knowledge,
he comes
to
an abyss, which at first seems bottomless. The support of the
physical world
ends
here. He cannot cross it. One can only cross this abyss by freeing
oneself from the physical, when one – symbolically speaking -
“grows wings”, in order to cross the abyss as a
psychic-spiritual being.
But
the Guardian of the Threshold calls forth to him how to beware of the
abyss, especially to be aware of the beasts which rise up as
spiritual figures from this abyss, that one should realize that these
beasts are the outer reflections of impure willing, feeling and
thinking – that they first must be overcome. And in a graphic
image one sees how his willing, feeling and thinking appear in three
animals – one ghastly, one horrid to look at, and so forth.
Then
the Guardian of the Threshold shows us how thinking, feeling and
willing can strengthen themselves after having consciously determined
to overcome the beasts. To enter the spiritual world, to visualize
the spiritual world,
we need to develop situation-meditations, in order to feel how the
cosmos speaks to us, how the hierarchies speak to us, how at first
everything foretells what awaits us there in the spiritual world.
And
from what has entered our souls through the mantras, we will realize
ever more that the human being must become different when he crosses
the abyss, when he wishes to live into what is beyond the abyss. We
will realize ever more: Here on earth we associate with the beings of
the three nature kingdoms and with men; beyond we associate with
disembodied souls and with the spirits of the higher hierarchies. It
is a different kind of relating, which requires a different state of
mind. [original: Seelenverfassung
= soul-constitution].
It
is again the task of the Guardian of the Threshold to strongly
indicate how the human being must comport himself when faced with the
fact that when he crosses the abyss and experiences something of the
reality of the spiritual world, he must do so with a completely
different state of mind.
The
person will realize that two states of mind can
be a reality within him:
the one on this side of the abyss with normal consciousness; and the
one beyond the abyss, outside the physical and etheric bodies –
the state of mind in the purely spiritual world.
When
the difference between these states of mind appears, great dangers
await him, dangers which appear at first to be slight deviations from
the normal state of mind which are always present within the psyche,
but which are pathological deformities when carried to an extreme. Of
course it must be emphasized: When the journey to the higher worlds
is undertaken as it is carefully described in my book Knowledge
of the Higher Worlds and its Attainment, in
many
shorter works which have appeared in anthroposophical circles, and in
the second part of my An
Outline of Occult Science, then
aberration from the normal
condition
of
the mind cannot occur, not even in the slightest degree. The person
will cross into the spiritual world in the full consciousness of
normal human understanding,
first
in knowledge and also through initiation. But he must know how,
in two ways,
he may lose the everyday capacity for understanding, which holds him
securely to life, if he does not adhere to the right guidelines into
the spiritual world.
Here
on this side of the threshold we are standing on the earth, on the
solid earthly elements. The ground is beneath our
feet,
it is our support. Around us is the watery element, which also
participates in the formation of our own bodies. In ordinary life
this watery element cannot support us, but it interpenetrates us,
transforms itself into our blood. It is contained in our growth, in
our forces of nutrition. We breathe the air. The airy or gaseous
element is all around us. Warmth is all around us: the warmth ether,
the fourth element.
In
ordinary life they are separate from each other. Where there is solid
earth there is not water; where there is water there is not air;
where
there
is air there is not water. Only fire – warmth –
interpenetrates all. It is the only thing which interpenetrates
everything.
The
moment we leave the physical body – also with the first push,
my dear friends – this separation of the elements ceases. We
enlarge ourselves, we expand, and at the same time we are in earth,
water, fire, air. We can no longer distinguish them from each other
and the
individual
attributes of these four elements have ceased to exist. The earth is
no longer our support, for it is no longer solid. The water no longer
forms us, for its formative force has ended. Once in the spiritual
world it is as though we were dissolving, as ice melts in warm water,
for we have become one with the water. We could not float in it, for
that would mean that we were still separate from it. The blood is no
longer a separate element in the blood vessels, but our blood becomes
one with the all-pervading watery element of the universe. And air:
it ceases being the formative breathing force in us. Warmth ceases to
enkindle us to an I, and make us feel that we are a Self within the
warmth. It all ends. We must meet this ending of the differentiation
between earth, water, air and fire in the right frame of mind.
Imagine
that we have already flown over the abyss. We have arrived on the
other side, my dear sisters and brothers. The Guardian of the
Threshold calls out to us, we should turn around again and face him.
Imagine
it vividly, my dear sisters and brothers. The person has arrived on
the other side, where the truths and knowledge of the spirit
will
be revealed to him. He stands on the other side. The Guardian of the
Threshold invokes him to turn around in order to receive the advice
he needs now that he has been touched by the state of mind which is
on the other side of the threshold, where one lives within the four
elements: in earth, water, air, fire.
He
encounters there – pardon the trivial expression, my dear
sisters and brothers – the illusion of being in love with
release from the solid earth, from the formative water force, from
the creative force of air, from the selfhood awakening force of
warmth; he feels delight in spiritual beatitude, dedicated to it and
wishes to remain in this state of spiritual beatitude. It overcomes
him because the Luciferic temptation is approachng him. Depending on
his karma, he can be more or less susceptible to this temptation. If
he is so susceptible that he is utterly in love with the experience
of dissolving into earth, water, air and fire, the luciferic
forces
will apprehend him and he will no longer leave this state of mind. He
succumbs to the danger of continuing in this state of mind when he
returns to everyday life.
The
Guardian of the Threshold must call out to him: You may not do that.
You may not succumb to Lucifer. You may not merely feel the delight
of bliss in dissolving in earth, water, fire, air. When you return to
the physical world you must again take on the state of mind of
ordinary consciousness; otherwise in the future you will be an
unstable
person in the physical world.
That
is the luciferic danger, that upon return from the spiritual world,
from beyond the threshold, one becomes an unstable, confused person,
no longer versed in the ways of the world, a dreamer who confuses
dreaming for idealism and who is contemptuous of ordinary
consciousness. That you must not do. And the Guardian of the
Threshold urgently admonishes us that we must resolve to live in the
world, be it the earthly, be it the spiritual, in the way which
corresponds to each.
But
the Guardian of the Threshold adds a second admonishment: that when
we cross over with separated thinking, feeling and willing, we must
pay attention to what extent earthly inclinations are still present
in this thinking, feeling and willing.
The
person may be inclined to fixate on his experiences on this side of
the threshold because of having the earth's support, and cross the
threshold in a materialistic state of mind, cross with the congealed
formative forces of water. If so, he can be plagued by earthly
arrogance and say to himself: In life on earth I breathed, inhaled
that breath from which the Father-God once created the human soul,
human life. I can also do that if only I am freed from earthly
limitations.
But
if the person wants to bring over into the spiritual world what he
has of creative divine force through his breath, he will succumb to
the Ahrimanic temptation. Then he will not be able to return, because
before he does so he will become faint. He will be more or less
unconscious. His consciousness will be paralyzed. Because his
consciousness has been paralyzed, he more or less becomes an
instrument of the Ahrimanic
powers in the spiritual world.
Although
today humanity is crudely hardened by materialism, since the
beginning of the Michael age it is almost being dragged over into the
spiritual world by spiritual life itself.
And
what it means when the ahrimanic powers seize humanity when its
consciousness is paralyzed, though otherwise in a fully waking state,
has been amply demonstrated, my dear friends, by the outbreak of the
great [first] World War.
When
this World War broke out, I said to many people: The history of this
war can not be written from the physical plane alone. Documents alone
do not speak the truth, because of the thirty or forty men in Europe
who directly participated in the outbreak of the war, many of them
had dimmed consciousness at the decisive moments. They became
instruments for the ahrimanic powers on this side. So that much of
what happened during this war was instigated by the ahrimanic powers.
The war can only be written about in an occult way.
What
is seen – in many respects modified on this side of the
threshold – in many leading personalities at the outbreak of
this World War, can be observed in those who preserved the habits of
the mind and carried them over beyond the threshold and whose
consciousness became paralyzed, muted, and they became instruments of
the ahrimanic powers.
It
must be perfectly clear that the human being may not carry over to
this side the state of mind applicable to beyond the threshold, and
that he may not carry over to the other side the state of mind
applicable to this side. Rather must he develop a strong inner human
consciousness for each domain – for this side and for beyond
the threshold.
That
applies to all four elements in the Guardian of the Threshold's
admonition. We shall now work on these admonitions in meditation.
So
let us imagine, my dear sisters and brothers, that you are standing
on the other side of the threshold. The Guardian beckons. You look at
his face. At first he calls out to you, admonishing:
Where
is the earth's solidity which supported you?
We
no longer have it. But the inner heart is motivated to give an
answer. But this heart can be innerly motivated in a threefold way to
an answer from the cosmos.
It
can be motivated from the Christ and his power. Then it answers:
I
abandon its foundation – the earth's solidity, that is –
as long as the spirit supports me.
That
is the correct attitude, that I abandon the earth's support as long
as the spirit carries me in the spirit-domain, as long as I am out of
the body. But the heart can also be motivated by Lucifer. Then it
answers:
I
feel rapture, for from now on I do not need its support.
That
is how one speaks with arrogance, with pride, as though he also does
not need the support when he returns to the physical world.
Or
the heart can be motivated by Ahriman. Then it answers:
I
will hammer it down even harder – the support – with the
spirit's power, and bring it over with me.
No
one should recoil from meditatively calling to mind again and again
all three answers in order to freely choose the first one. For he
must feel: the inner self tends to waver to Lucifer, and to Ahriman.
One must keep this in mind during meditation.
For
the earth element the meditation must therefore contain:
[The
first part of the mantra is written on the blackboard. (Writing is
always shown in italics).]
1)
The Guardian – speaks – Where is the earth's solidity,
which supported you?
The
Human heart must answer. If it is motivated by Christ, it answers:
Christ:
I leave its foundation as long as the spirit supports me.
If
the soul is motivated by Lucifer, it answers:
Lucifer:
I feel rapture, for from now on I do not need its support.
Now
the heart omits “as
long as”
if it wants to replace the temporal with the eternal, which
transforms
the
sentence. If the heart is motivated by Ahriman, it answers:
Ahriman:
I will hammer it down even harder – the
support
– with the spirit's power.
In order that the soul
fully dedicate itself to what is coming, we have the Guardian of the
Threshold's second admonition, which is related to water's formative
force. This formative force of water forms the solid organs in us
from the liquid elements. All that we consume for nourishment must
first become liquid, from which the organs are formed. All our
sharply contoured organs are formed out of the liquid element. This
formative force terminates once we tread the realm beyond the
threshold. The Guardian warns us that this is the case. He calls to
us once we stand on the other side of the Threshold facing his stern
countenance:
[The
second part of the mantra is written on the blackboard.]
Guardian:
Where is the water's formative force which pervaded you?
The
person answers if he is motivated in his heart by Christ:
My
life extinguishes it, as long as the spirit forms me.
Christ:
My life extinguishes it (“it”
is the formative force),
as
long as
the spirit forms me.
Again,
modestly, “as long as” is used.
Now,
when one is over there, out of the body, the spirit is beginning to
form.
If
the soul is motivated by Lucifer, it leaves out “as long as”
and forms the sentence in a prideful, arrogant way:
Lucifer:
My life melts it away
– what is extinguished can be re-kindled; what melts remains
melted – so
I am released from it.
If
the soul is motivated by Ahriman, it answers:
Ahriman:
My life solidifies it, so I transfer it to the spirit-realm.
Observe, my dear
sisters and brothers,
how
everything in mantric verses is innerly certain and meaningfully
formed. Here [in the first verse] is: “I leave”, “I
feel”, “I
will”. The “I” speaks in the answer. In the second
verse the I no longer speaks egocentrically, but it says: “My
life”: “my life dissolves”, “my life melts”,
“my life solidifies”. It is all appropriate to reality if
correctly spoken in the spirit. The carelessness in formulating
sentences, which is common in the physical realm, may not be brought
over into the spirit-realm. In the spirit-realm all that is spoken
must be precise and exact.
You must understand, my
dear friends, the reality that this Esoteric School is not
established by human will, but by the spiritual world, as I said at
the beginning. Everything given here in the Esoteric School of the
Goetheanum is only spoken through my lips, but is dictated by the
spiritual world. It must be that way in every legitimately existing
esoteric school – also in the present and in the immediate
future, as it was in the ancient holy Mysteries. And this Esoteric
School is the true Michael- School, the institution of those
spiritual beings who possess the inspiration of Michael's cosmic
will.
In
respect to air, the Guardian of the Threshold speaks again,
warningly: Where is the air's stimulating force which awakened you? –
awakened you to existence.
Just as Jehovah formed
a feeling being from a merely living being by means of living breath
and the stimulating power of air, so can a human being become a
feeling being through the stimulation exercised on his senses by the
outer world. What, though, are the senses?
My dear sisters
and
brothers, the senses are nothing other than differentiated breathing
organs. Eye, ear – all are refined breathing organs. Breathing
expands to all the senses. As it lives in the lung, it lives in the
eye. Except that in the lungs it combines with carbon, and in the
ears with highly rarefied silica. Carbon dioxide is formed in the
organism. [He draws on the blackboard: “Kohlensäure”
= carbon dioxide (red)] In the senses, very fine silicic acid is
formed [“Kieselsäure” = silicic acid yellow.]
Man lives downward by
converting oxygen to carbon dioxide. He lives upward into the zone of
his sense-nervous system by combining oxygen with silica, forming
very fine silicic acid. [green]. So we live in a way that when breath
turns to blood, it generates carbon dioxide; when breath passes
around the senses it generates silicic acid – downward and
outward through breath: carbon dioxide; toward the senses and back
from the senses to the breathing process in very fine doses of
silicic acid.
The Guardian of the
Threshold calls to us about all that is in the air:
Where
is the air's stimulating force, which awakened you?
He
who is motivated in his heart by
Christ
answers:
My
soul breathes the air of heaven – no longer the air of earth,
the air of heaven – as long as the spirit surrounds me.
The
heart motivated by Lucifer answers:
My
soul regards it not in the spirit's rapture.
The
heart motivated by Ahriman answers:
My
soul absorbs it, that I may learn divine creation.
As
Jehovah once created with air, the ahrimanically-minded
absorbs the air in order to carry it over to the spiritual world.
The
Guardian speaks to the human being:
[The
third part of the mantra is written on the blackboard:]
Guardian:
Where is the air's stimulating force, which awakened you?
The
heart motivated by Christ speaks:
Christ:
My soul breathes the air of heaven, as long as the spirit surrounds
me.
The
heart motivated by Lucifer speaks:
Lucifer:
My soul regards it not in the spirit's rapture.
The
heart motivated by Ahriman speaks:
Ahriman:
My soul absorbs it, that I may learn divine creation.
About fire, the warmth
element,
the
Guardian now speaks the last of his element- words, warning the human
not to lose himself in the warmth element as it is experienced in
physical earthly existence, but also not to carry it over to the
spiritual world.
Beforehand,
my dear sisters and brothers, I want to draw your attention to the
ascending direction:
“I”
the human being says
at first.
“My
life” the human being says.
“My
soul” says the human being.
Now
the Guarding speaks warningly about the fire element:
[The
fourth part of the mantra is written on the blackboard:]
Guardian:
Where is fire's cleansing – or
purification
– which ignited your I?
Our I lives in what
pervades us as warmth, as fire. In these esoteric classes, my dear
sisters and brothers, I have already indicated once that his solid
element remains in man's unconscious, the liquid element also,
although one does feels pleasure at being in the liquid element; when
sated or hungry, he also feels the liquid element's attributes. Man
already feels the air element in his soul: he finds breathing
difficult when the air's composition is not right and with breathing
difficulty, angst. Warmth is something in which the human being feels
completely immersed. He accompanies his cold and warm states with his
whole I. Fire ignites the I.
The
heart motivated by Christ answers:
Christ:
My I blazes in God's fire, as long as the spirit ignites me.
Man
does not need earthly-material warmth when the spirit enflames or
ignites: the I blazes in divine fire, not in earthly warmth, not in
earthly fire.
But
the heart motivated by Lucifer answers:
My
I has the force of flame through the spirit's solar power.
In
immense pride the I – ensnared by Lucifer – wants to
usurp for itself the fire element that comes from the sun, instead of
only for the time the spirit sets it ablaze – keep it
forever, never give it away.
Lucifer:
My I has the force of flame through the spirit's solar power.
The heart motivated by
Ahriman answers as though it wants to keep for itself the fire it had
captured on earth and carry it over to the spiritual world – to
master the spiritual world with the I-fire of the physical world.
Ahriman:
My I has its own fire, which ignites through self-enfoldment.
The
I wills not to blaze in the spirit, but to develop its own fire.
There
is again an ascending direction in the formulation:
The
person first says “I”:
I
leave
I
feel
I
will
He
then becomes more objective in that what is in him refers to “My”:
My
life extinguishes
My
life melts
My
life solidifies.
He
goes more within, what is within makes him objective:
My
soul breathes
My
soul cares not
My
soul absorbs it.
Now he delves deeper
into himself. And – note the difference, my dear sisters and
brothers – before only “I” was said. Now the “I”
becomes objective: “My I”, as though it were another, as
if one were to speak of the other as a possession. One is more
outside of the physical body – which disposes one to speak so
egoistically of the “I” – and speaks:
My I
as of an object. That
is the correct speech here.
One gets to know this
way of speaking in all its intensity, my dear sisters and brothers,
when one speaks with souls who have passed through the gates of death
and have been a while in the spiritual world. They never say “I”,
but they say “my I”. I have not yet heard a dead person
say “I” after death, at most only shortly after death.
But after a certain time after death they always say “my I”,
for they see the I with the eyes of the gods. They become completely
objective.
It is characteristic. Therefore an enunciation from a dead person who
has been dead a long time can never be true if he says “I”
and not “my I”. So the soul speaks this “my I”
here in the fourth place when standing before the Guardian of the
Threshold.
That, my dear friends,
is the wonderful conversation at the threshold between the Guardian
of the Threshold and the human being. It is distinctive. And this
distinctiveness is really present when one stands before the Guardian
of the Threshold in this situation. When one practices the meditation
of this dialog in the right way, as has been described here, one must
be able to intuitively hear it. Therefore we
meditate
these words correctly, which have come to you here today as mantric
words, my dear sisters and brothers, when in a sense we hear
ourselves speaking the words after the Guardian has been heard in our
souls. Thus we meditate first hearing the Guardian of the Threshold
four times as I, II, III and IV, as earth, water, air and fire; then
as when we let our own soul answer, but in such a way that first we
hear the answer innerly ensouled by Christ, the second answer as the
voice of the tempter, the third answer as the voice of the inflated
materialistic Ahriman-spirit, which approaches the human being with
the desire to carry the mineralized human being into the spiritual
world.
Therefore, to end this esoteric
lesson today, the way this is to be
meditated resounds in us:
Where is the earth's
solidity, which supported you?
I leave its foundation,
as long as the spirit supports me.
I feel rapture, for
from now on I do not need its support.
I will hammer it down
even harder with the spirit's power.
Where is the water's
formative force which pervaded you?
My life extinguishes
it, as long as the spirit forms me.
My life melts it away,
so I am released from it.
My life solidifies it,
so I transfer it to the spirit-realm.
Where is the air's
stimulating force, which awakened you?
My soul breathes the
air of heaven, as long as the spirit surrounds me.
My soul regards it not
in the spirit's rapture.
My soul absorbs it,
that I may learn divine creation.
Where is fire's
cleansing, which ignited your I?
My I blazes in God's
fire, as long as the spirit ignites me.
My I has the force of
flame through the spirit's solar power.
My I has its own fire,
which ignites through self-enfolding.
Continued in the next
issue of SouthernCrossReview.org
Home