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Spiritual Soul Instructions and View of the World

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Spiritual Soul Instructions and View of the World RUDOLF STEINER Spiritual Teachings Concerning the Soul and Observation of the World Eighteen public lectures held in Berlin from 6th September 1903 until 8th December 1904 Translation of volume 52 of the Complete Works by Rudolf Steiner, original title: Spirituelle Seelenlehre und Weltbetrachtung, edited by Rudolf Steiner-Nachlassverwaltung Dornach (Switzerland), second edition 1986. ©1972 Rudolf Steiner-Nachlassverwaltung, Dornach (Switzerland) Preface to this Edition The talks of this volume belong to that part of Rudolf Steiner’s lecturing work with which he turned to the general public. “Berlin had been the starting point for this public lecturing activity. What was treated in other cities in single talks could be expressed here in a coherent course of lectures whose topics merge into each other. They thereby received the character of a well-founded methodical introduction to spiritual science and could count on a regularly returning audience to which it was crucial to penetrate deeper and deeper into the fields of knowledge being revealed to it anew, while the bases of the understanding of the offered material were given to the newcomers.” (Marie Steiner) Since Rudolf Steiner could correct the transcripts only in few cases because of lack of time, his reservation has to be taken into consideration with all publications of talks: “It has just to be accepted that mistakes may be found in the transcripts not checked by me.” The first of five lecture courses of this volume deals with the eternal core of the human being, the soul, the concept of God, and Christianity in the theosophical view and in the scientific discussion. In the second course, Rudolf Steiner — like in his Philosophy of Freedom — indicates the hopelessness and consequences of Kant’s philosophy and shows the way to a knowledge of the spirit. There follows the representation of the relation of the soul to the body, to destiny and to the spirit. The historical soul doctrines are compared with the contemporary ones. The explanations about the soul in the hypnotic state already point to the fourth course of lectures which deal with the search for the supersensible experience in spiritism, hypnotism, and somnambulism. In doing so, Rudolf Steiner shows the justified meeting points and the necessary differences between these movements and theosophy. Four talks on challenges of theosophy by questions of the human beings and by the criticism of science finish the volume. Contents I The Eternal and the Transient in the Human Being Berlin, 6th September 1903 II The Origin of the Soul Berlin, 3rd October 1903 III The Nature of God from the Theosophical Standpoint Berlin, 7th November 1903 IV Theosophy and Christianity Berlin, 4th January 1904 V The Epistemological Bases of Theosophy, Part I Berlin, 27th November 1903 VI The Epistemological Bases of Theosophy, Part II Berlin, 4th December 1903 VII The Epistemological Bases of Theosophy, Part III Berlin, 17th December 1903 VIII Theosophical Teachings of the Soul, Part I Berlin, 16th March 1904 IX Theosophical Teachings of the Soul, Part II Berlin, 23rd March 1904 X Theosophical Teachings of the Soul, Part III Berlin, 30th March 1904 XI Theosophy und Spiritism Berlin, 1st February 1904 XII Theosophy und Somnambulism Berlin, 7th March 1904 XIII The History of Spiritism Berlin, 30th May 1904 XIV The History of Hypnotism und Somnambulism Berlin, 6th June 1904 XV What Does the Modern Human Being Find in Theosophy? Berlin, 8th March 1904 XVI What Do Our Scholars Know about Theosophy? Berlin, 28th April 1904 XVII Is Theosophy Unscientific? Berlin, 6th October 1904 XVIII Is Theosophy Buddhist Propaganda? Berlin, 8th December 1904 The Eternal and the Transient of the Human Being Berlin, 6th September 1903 The object about which I will talk here is certainly one in which all people are interested. Who could say that he is not interested in the question of immortality with all his thoughts? We need only to realise that the human being thinking of death feels a horror. Even the few people who are weary of life and look for rest in death cannot get through this horror completely. One has tried to answer this question in the most different way. Remember, however, that nobody can speak about anything impartially in which he is interested. Will he be able to speak then impartially about this question which is of the deepest interest for his whole life? And, besides, you must take something else into consideration: how much does depend on it for the culture. The development of our whole culture depends on it how this question is answered. The standpoint of somebody to the cultural questions is quite different if he believes in the eternal of the human being. One hears saying that it was wrong to give the human being this hope of a next world. The poor man would be put off until the next world and would be thereby prevented from creating a better life here. Others say that only in this way existence can generally be endured. If with such a matter the wishes of the human beings are considered so strongly, all the reasons are looked out for it. It would have mattered a little to the human being to prove that two times two are not four if his happiness had depended on this proof. Because the human being could not omit to let his wishes have a say in this question of immortality, it had to be put over and over again. Because the subjective feeling of happiness is involved in this question. However, just this fact has made this question so suspicious to the modern natural sciences. And rightly so! Just the most significant men of this science expressed themselves against the immortality of the human being. Ludwig Feuerbach says: “one thought immortality first and then proved it.” Thus he suggests that the human being tried to find arguments because he wishes them. David Friedrich Strauss and recently Ernst Haeckel in his World Riddles express themselves in a similar way. If now I had to say something that violates the modern natural sciences, I would not be able to speak about this question. But just the admiration of Haeckel’s great achievements in his fields and for Haeckel as one of the most monumental spirits of the present time lets me take a stand in his sense against his conclusions. Today, something else than fighting against the natural sciences is my object. Theosophy is not against the natural sciences, but goes with them. But, besides, it does not stop. It does not believe that we have gone so wonderfully far only in the 19-th century; while during all centuries before unreason and superstition would have held sway, now truth has been brought to light only by the science of our time. If truth stood on such weak feet, one could have little confidence. However, we know that truth formed the core in the teachings of wisdom of Buddha, of the Jewish priests et cetera. It is the task of theosophy to search for this core in all different theories. But it also does not spare the science of the 19-th century. Because this is in such a way, we are certainly allowed to deal with the question also from the standpoint of science. It can form the basis that way from which we start if we search for the eternal in the human being. Feuerbach is certainly right with his remark quoted before if he turns against the method of the science of the last fourteen centuries. However, he is wrong concerning the wisdom of former times. Because the way to guide the human being to the cognition of truth in the ancient schools of wisdom was totally different. Only during the later centuries of Christianity the faith was demanded to which then the scholars produced the proofs. That was not the case in the mysteries of antiquity. That wisdom which was not disseminated just like that, which remained a possession of few people, which was delivered to the initiate by instructions of the priests in holy temple sites, had another avenue to lead their pupils to truth. They kept the knowledge secret to those who were not prepared. One would have regarded it as profaned if one had informed anybody without selection. One only regarded somebody as worthy who had developed his cultural life by means of long exercise to understand the truth in higher sense. One tells in the traditions of Judaism that when once a rabbi pronounced something of the secret knowledge his listeners reproached him: “o old man, had you been quiet! What have you done! You bewilder the people.” — One saw a big threat betraying the mysteries if they were in everybody’s mouth and would be desecrated and distorted that way. Only in holy shyness one approached them. The probation was strict which the pupils of the mysteries had to go through. Our time can hardly imagine the severe probations which were imposed on the pupil. We find with the Pythagoreans that the pupils called themselves listeners. For years they are only silent listeners, and it is according to the spirit of this time that this silence extended up to five years. They are silent in this time. Silence, that is in this case: renunciation of any discussion, of any criticism. Today where the principle applies: “test everything and keep the best” — where everybody believes to be able to judge about everything where with the help of journalism everybody forms his judgment quickly also about that which he does not understand at all, one has no notion of that which one demanded from a pupil at that time.
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