Preliminary Lecture Before the Genesis Lecture Cycle

GA 122 — Munich

We are about to embark on an important cycle of lectures, and it may be said in advance that this cycle of lectures can only be undertaken now, after years of work in the field of spiritual science. And it may be said further that the great ideas to which we will devote ourselves in the coming days need, in a certain respect, the mood that we were able to achieve through the two performances that took place in the last days. These performances were intended to lead our hearts into that mood, into that emotional state, which is necessary so that what is to confront us in the anthroposophical field is imbued with the right warmth and the right intimacy. It has often been emphasized that the abstract thoughts and ideas that confront us in our field can only develop their full potency in our soul when they are immersed in this warm intimacy of experience. Only this allows our soul to feel that through our anthroposophical ideas we are approaching realms of existence to which we are drawn not only by a certain yearning for knowledge but also by our hearts, and in relation to which we can have what we call a sacred mood in the fullest sense of the word. And perhaps never in all these years have I felt more so than at this moment, as we stand on the threshold of a lecture cycle that may not unjustifiably be said to venture a little towards approaching human thoughts to what, like primal words, have been and has occupied human minds, to direct human hearts and human minds to that which man, as the highest, as the most powerful, can perceive for him: his own origin in his greatness.

Before this lecture cycle begins, I would like to touch on something anthroposophically familiar, precisely because we were able to let the preparation for this cycle pass us by. At the beginning of last year's cycle, I was already able to point out how symbolically significant these events in Munich are for our anthroposophical life. And I was able to point out how, over the years, what we might call the patience of waiting in a truly anthroposophical sense has carried us until the forces for any work have matured. And let me remind you once more that the presentation of 'The Children of Lucifer', which we were able to stage last year and which we were so happy to repeat these days, had to be awaited patiently by us for seven years. The work of seven years in the field of anthroposophy had to precede this presentation. Last year I recalled how I had given a lecture at the founding of our German Section in Berlin that was linked to the drama 'The Children of Lucifer', and how at that time it was an ideal floating before my soul, to be allowed to present this drama on the stage. After seven years of anthroposophical work, we have succeeded in doing so, and we can say that last year's performance was, in a certain sense, a milestone in our anthroposophical life. We were able to present an artistic interpretation of anthroposophical feeling and thinking to our dear friends. And it is precisely in such moments that we feel most at home in our anthroposophical environment, when we feel the anthroposophical life reaching out to and permeating us. The author of 'Children of Lucifer', whom we had the pleasure of seeing here last year at that performance and at last year's cycle, and whose presence we are delighted to enjoy again this year, has created a structure of ideas for the spiritual life of the present in his epochal work 'The Great Initiates', the effect of which on the souls and minds of the present can only be put into the right perspective by the future.

You would certainly be surprised in many cases if you were to compare the esteem in which spiritual forces and spiritual works of the past are held today in this or that period with that which prevailed in the consciousness of contemporaries at the time. It is so easy to mistake our own way of thinking about Goethe, Shakespeare or Dante for what their contemporaries were able to grasp and comprehend of the spiritual forces that have been incorporated into the advancing human spirit through such personalities. And we, as anthroposophists, must especially realize that man in his own time can least of all appreciate how significant and invigorating the spiritual work of contemporaries is for the soul. If we reflect that the future will judge things quite differently than the present can, then it may well be said that the appearance of the “Great Initiates” for the spiritual content and for the spiritual deepening of our time will one day be seen as something tremendously significant. For today, from many souls in the widest periphery of our present-day culture, the soul echoes are already radiating, which were made possible by the fact that these ideas have found their way into the hearts of our contemporaries. And these echoes are truly significant for our contemporaries, for they give countless people security in life, consolation and hope in the most difficult moments of this life. And only when we know how to rejoice in the right way in such a great spiritual deed of the present time, then we may say that we carry anthroposophical feeling and mood in a somewhat larger measure in our breasts. And out of that depth of soul from which the ideas of the “Great Initiates” shone, the figures of the “Children of Lucifer” are also formed and shaped, figures who lead us before the soul's eye to a great time of humanity, a time in which the old and the new, the old-established and the newly blossoming, collide in world evolution. And anthroposophists should understand how two things radiate together in this drama: human life, human work and human activity on the physical plane, as it is carried out by the figures who confront us in the “Children of Lucifer”, and into this work and activity shines that which we call the illumination from the higher worlds. And by staging a drama in which we show not only how human striving and human strength are rooted in the heart and in the mind, but also how inspiration from the holy places, from the sanctuaries of the temples, how the invisible powers glow and inspire human hearts. By showing this interweaving of supersensible worlds with our sensory world, we were able to establish a milestone in our anthroposophical movement.

For I may repeat this year at the starting point of our lecture cycle: the most important thing, the most essential thing in such an undertaking, is the hearts of those who have the understanding to take on such a work. That is the great error of our time, that one can believe that a work can be created and that it must have an effect. It is not only a matter of the tremendous works of Raphael or Michelangelo being in the world; it is a matter of there being hearts and souls in the world that can bring the magic of these works to life within themselves. Raphael and Michelangelo did not create for themselves alone; they created in resonance with those who were imbued with that culture, who were able to receive what they entrusted to the canvas. Our contemporary culture is chaotic, our contemporary culture has no unity of feeling. Let the greatest works have an effect on such a culture: they will leave hearts untouched. This must be the special feature of our anthroposophical movement: that we gather as a circle of people in whom similar feelings live, who are inspired by similar thoughts, in whom a similar enthusiasm becomes possible. On the boards, a drama unfolds in the image; in the hearts of the audience, a drama unfolds whose forces belong to the time. What the hearts in the auditorium felt, what took root in every heart, is a seed for the life of the future. Let us feel this, my dear friends, and above all, let us feel not only a sense of satisfaction, which might be cheap, but let us feel the responsibility that we thereby take upon our souls. That responsibility that tells us: Be exemplary for what must happen, for what must become possible, that the time culture of humanity becomes imbued with the consciousness that man here on the physical plane is the mediator between physical deeds, physical becoming and that which can only flow through him from the supersensible worlds into these worlds of the physical plane.

In a sense, we are only a spiritual family because we are drawn to the common paternal archetype that lives in our hearts and that I have just tried to characterize in this moment. And when we grasp what we are experiencing with our hearts, with our whole soul, when we grasp it by feeling it as belonging to our anthroposophical family, then we also feel in the right sense the happiness and see it with the most intimate satisfaction that we were now able to have the author of “Children of Lucifer” among us at the two performances and in the days that followed.

Please accept this in such a way that we can truly feel: long live the living anthroposophical forces of the present in the circle from which that which we have allowed to pass through our soul in recent days was allowed to flow.

My dear friends, it was already a great pleasure for me last year to point out the very place of work where we have been able to develop such a milestone of our anthroposophical activity. And it was a dear duty for me — and I emphasize the word “dear” and would like to explicitly note that you must not take “duty” in the trivial everyday sense — it was a dear duty for me and it is a dear duty for me to point out in this hour as well how our friends here worked not only with zeal but with devotion of all their strength to make these our anthroposophical events happen.

Those who see such performances may not always think about the fact that it takes a long time for what is ultimately presented to the eye in a few hours to actually be staged. And the way in which our dear friends here in this place worked together to bring the work about can, in a certain respect, be held up as a model for anthroposophical work, and perhaps also for human cooperation. This is especially true because a true anthroposophical approach would resist any kind of command in this work. Progress is only possible if the individual friends are fully committed, in a completely different way than could ever be the case in a similar artistic field. And this full commitment, not only in the few weeks available to us to prepare the performances, but this full commitment, this free and warm collaboration, it lasted for years. And since we have gathered here from the most diverse regions for this occasion, and since anthroposophists should not only get to know each other by exchanging a few words, so to speak, but also by knowing what is sacred to each other in their work, it is therefore appropriate on this occasion, we may well take a few moments to point out how we have been working here for years, grouping together at the appropriate moment what was needed to establish an anthroposophical achievement, as we were able to do in the last few days. And even if it were not required by external circumstances alone, my heart would urge me to point out at this hour the dedicated work of our friends that has made possible what we have been able to experience. Because you can believe it: only through this dedicated work has it become possible.

I said I would begin the lecture cycle with a kind of family discussion of what is on our minds. Above all, we can mention the many years of dedicated work of the two ladies, who work here purposefully and in close harmony with everything one could want in the anthroposophical field. For many years, Miss Stinde and Countess Kalckreuth have devoted their entire energies to the anthroposophical work here in this place. And that only through this dedicated, purposeful work in close harmony with the anthroposophical impulses has it become possible for us to give our satisfaction, that is something that I, above all, know best of all. And so you will find it all the more understandable that I am speaking these words for the two colleagues here in Munich on this occasion, from a heart full of gratitude. Then there is the dedicated work of those who, so to speak, directly expose their strengths in the weeks dedicated to our work.

Yesterday we tried to present to you an artistic image of the path to the heights where the human being can experience what is to flow through anthroposophical development, what the soul researcher must experience, so to speak. Perhaps in connection with some of what is to be said in this lecture cycle, there will be an opportunity to refer to this or that which was to be presented to your soul's eye yesterday. The life of one who strives towards spiritual knowledge had to be shown, it had to be shown how he outgrows the physical plane, how everything that happens around him, and which might seem quite ordinary to another person, becomes significant to him already here on the physical plane. The soul of the spiritual seeker must grow out of the events of the physical plane. And then it had to be shown what this soul must experience within itself when everything that happens around us in human destiny, human suffering, human desire, human striving and human illusions pours into it; how this soul can be crushed and can be crushed, how the power of wisdom can struggle through this shattering, and how only then, when man believes that he has become alienated from the sensual world in a certain respect, do the great deceptions approach him.

Yes, with the words that the world is Maya or illusion, or: “Through knowledge we penetrate to truth,” with these words much is said and yet again very little. What is meant by this must be experienced by each person in their own individual way. Therefore, what is generally true could only be shown, one might say, in a way that truly filled the soul, by showing it in the life of a single figure. Not how everyone approaches initiation, but how the very individual figure of Johannes Thomasius can approach the gate of knowledge from his own circumstances, that is what should be shown. And it would be quite wrong for anyone to believe that he could present the event shown in the meditation room, the ascent of Maria from her earthly body into the devachan, as a general event. The event is absolutely real, spiritually real, but it is an event through which precisely a personality of the kind that Johannes Thomasius presents, should receive the impulse to ascend into the spiritual worlds.

And I would like to draw your attention in particular to the moment when it is shown how the soul, when it has already found the strength to rise above the ordinary illusion, is then confronted with the possibility of the great deceptions. Assume that Johannes Thomasius would not be able to see through – even if he does not do so consciously, but only feels it with an inner eye – that the figure that remains in the meditation room and hurls the curse at the hierophant no longer contains the same individuality that he has to follow. Assume that the Hierophant or even Johannes Thomasius might be troubled by this for a moment. Then it would be impossible for an unforeseeable time to continue the path of knowledge for Johannes Thomasius in any way. In that case, the whole thing would be over at that moment, not only for Johannes Thomasius but also for the hierophant, who would then not have been able to develop the strong powers in Johannes Thomasius that could have led him over this cliff. The hierophant would have to resign from his office, and Johannes Thomasius would have lost an enormous amount of time in his ascent. If you try to visualize the scenes that just precede this moment and the feelings that have been working in the soul of John Thomasius, the special kind of pain, the special kind of experiences, then you may come to the conclusion that the power of wisdom, without him even knowing it, has become so strong in him that he can survive this tremendous jolt in his life. All these experiences, which take place without anything being visibly present before the eye of the soul, must precede before what objectively presents itself to the soul, initially in a pictorial way, may follow in the right way before the spiritual eye. This then takes place in the next scenes. It is pain that first shakes the human being to the core; it is the force of the impulse that arises from resisting the possibility of the greatest deception. All this develops into a tension in the soul that, if we may say so, turns our gaze around and allows what was previously only subjective to step before our soul with the force of the objective.

What you see in the next scenes, which is attempted to be described in a spiritually realistic way, represents what the soul gradually growing into the higher worlds feels as the outer reflection of what it first experiences in its own soul, and what is true without the one who experiences it being able to know how much of it is true. First, the human being is led to see how the time in which we live as sensual people, in terms of its causes and effects, borders on everything. One does not just see the small section presented by the material world, but one learns to understand that what appears before our eyes in the material world is only the expression of a spiritual reality. Therefore, Johannes Thomasius sees with his spiritual eye the man who first approached him on the physical plane, Capesius, not as he is now, but as he was decades before as a young man. And he sees the other, Strader, not in the form he has in the present, but he sees him prophetically ahead, as he must become if he continues to develop in the same way as he is in that present. Only then do we understand the moment when we can extend this moment beyond the present into the past and the future. But then we are confronted with the spiritual world, with which man is always in relationship, even if he is unable to see through it with his outer physical mind, with his outer sensuality.

Believe me, it is not an image, not a symbol, it is realistically described, when in the scene where the young Capesius develops his ideals out of full, justified for the sensual world, heartfelt feelings – but which have the one thing against them in the spiritual world, namely, that they are rooted only in the outer world, in that which can be perceived by the senses. Man is not an isolated being. What man expresses in his words, what he brings about in his thoughts, what lives in his feelings, all this is connected with the whole cosmos, and every word, every feeling, every thought has its continuation. Without man knowing it, his error, his false feeling is destructive in the elemental realms of our existence. And what weighs most heavily on the soul of anyone who treads the path to knowledge, based on these first experiences in the spiritual world, is the great sense of responsibility that tells us: “What you do as a human being is not done merely in the isolated place where your lips move, where you think, where your heart beats: it belongs to the whole world. If it is fruitful, it is fruitful throughout the world; if it is a destructive error, it is a destructive force throughout the world.

Everything we can experience in this way during our ascent continues to work in our soul. If it has worked in the right way, it pushes us up into higher regions of spiritual life, as they have been tried to be described in the devachanic realm, where the soul of Maria with her companions was preceded by Johannes Thomasius. Do not take it as an abstract thought, but as a spiritual reality, when I say that these three helpers, Philia, Astrid and Luna, are the forces that we describe in abstracto, when we speak of the physical plane, as sentient soul, mind soul and consciousness soul. But do not be under the illusion that something has been achieved by attempting to symbolize the individual figures in an artistically conceived work with abstract terms. They are not meant in that way. They are intended as real forms, as active forces. In Devachan you will not find tablets bearing the words sentient soul, intellectual soul, consciousness soul; you will find there real entities, as real for the spiritual world as a human being in flesh and blood can possibly be on the physical plane. Man should realize that he robs things of their richness when he tries to cover everything with symbolic abstractions. In the world he has traversed up to this point, Johannes Thomasius has only experienced what one might call: the spiritual world spread out in pictorial form before the eye of his soul. Whether he himself, as a subjective entity, is the cause of this world, or whether it has a truth grounded in itself, he could not decide until then. How much of this world is illusion and how much is reality, he had to bring to a decision only in that higher realm where he encountered the soul of Mary.

Imagine that one night, when you fell asleep, you were suddenly transported to a completely different world and you could not find anything in this other world that would give you a point of contact with what you had experienced before. You would not be the same person, the same being at all. You must have the possibility of taking something over into the other world and seeing it there again, so that the truth is guaranteed to you. This can only be done for the spiritual world by acquiring a firm base in this world, which gives you certainty of truth. In a dramatic presentation, this should be given in such a way that Johannes Thomasius on the physical plane is connected not only with his affects, with his passions, but with the depths of his heart, with the essence of Maria, so that he experiences a most spiritual in this connection already on the physical plane. Only for this reason could that center of gravity also be in the spiritual world, from which everything else in the spiritual world is true. The certainty of truth radiates over everything else in the spiritual world, so that Johannes Thomasius finds a point of support that he has already come to know in the physical world other than through the mere 'illusions of sensuality or of the mind. In this way the two worlds become linked for him, and he becomes ripe to expand his memory in a real way, to transcend the course of his life and thus to grow spiritually beyond the sensory world that surrounds us.

Therefore, at this point something occurs that, if one may say so, encompasses a certain mystery of the spiritual world. Theodora, who sees into the future on the physical plane and is able to foresee the momentous event we are about to describe, the new appearance of the Christ-figure, is able on the spiritual plane to summon the significance of the past before the soul. Everything, if realistically depicted, must be presented in the spiritual world as it really is. The past, with its forces, becomes significant for the beings living in Devachan in its significance in that the opposing forces that we perceive here on the physical plane as prophetic forces are unfolded there. It is a realistic description that Theodora is the seer into the future on the physical plane and the conscience and memory awakener for the past on the spiritual plane, and thus brings about the moment through which Johannes Thomasius looks back into his own past, in which he was already connected with the individuality of Maria. In this way he is prepared to undergo everything in his further life that leads him to a conscious realization of the spiritual world. And you see how, on the one hand, the soul becomes something completely different when it is permeated and permeated by the experiences of the spiritual worlds, how all things appear in a new light. How what otherwise causes us agony and pain, when we experience it as another self in our own self, gives us comfort and hope, how being poured out into the world makes us great and significant; and we see how man, so to speak, grows into those parts of the universe. But we also see how man must not become proud at all, how error and the possibility of error have not yet left his side, and how it is possible that Johannes Thomasius, who has already much of the spiritual worlds, could nevertheless feel spiritually as if the devil in the flesh were entering the room, while his greatest benefactor, Benedictus, was approaching him.

Just as this is possible, so are countless deceptions of the most diverse kinds possible on the spiritual plane. This should not make anyone faint-hearted; but it must make everyone so that, on the one hand, they must exercise caution with regard to the spiritual world, and on the other hand, they must look forward with courage and boldness to the possibility of error and must not become faint-hearted in any way when something presents itself that looks like an erroneous report from a spiritual world. Man must go through all these things in reality if he really wants to approach what can be called the temple of knowledge, if he wants to ascend to the real understanding of the four great powers of the world that guide and direct world destiny in a certain way and that are represented by the four hierophants of the temple.

If we have an inkling that the soul must undergo such trials before it is able to see how the sensual world flows out of the spiritual world, and if we attune ourselves to the fact that we not in a banal way, using everyday words, but that we first want to acquire the inner value of the words, then only can we get a sense of how the primal words are meant, with which creation is characterized at the beginning of the Bible. We must feel that we must unlearn the ordinary meaning that we carry in our souls of the words “heaven and earth,” “create,” “light and darkness,” and all the other words. We must unlearn the feelings that we entertain in our daily lives towards these words, and we must make a little effort to place new shades of feeling, new word values, into our souls for this lecture cycle, so that we not only hear what is in the ideas, but to hear it as it is meant and as it can only be understood if we meet what speaks to us from dark regions of the world with a soul attuned to it.

In a very brief sketch of words, I tried to tell you what we had shown you yesterday. That we were able to show this under relatively difficult circumstances was again only possible through the loyal, dedicated work of many of our anthroposophical friends. And let me also say what is closest to my heart: that I myself and probably all those who know something about it cannot thank enough all those who have worked with us to dare to make this attempt, because it was only an attempt. It was not attempted under the easiest of circumstances; those who worked with us had to work with full commitment of their strength for weeks and especially in the last week. And we can count it a beautiful achievement of our anthroposophical life that we have artists in our midst who have been faithfully supporting us with their artistic strength for two years now. Above all, let me mention our dear friend Doser, who not only took on the difficult task of bringing Phosphorus to the stage last year and this year, but who also took on the role of the character who was particularly close to my heart this year and who is infinitely important for what we tried to show yesterday: the character of Capesius. Perhaps you will gradually feel why this Capesius character is particularly important. And the other character, the character of Strader, played by our dear Mr. Seiling, who has been faithfully at our side for two years now, is also of great importance in this context. I must not forget to mention how our dear Mr. Seiling, through his very special vocal talent, I cannot call it anything else, supports us when it comes to allowing the spiritual world to enter the physical world in a symbolic way. We owe all the love and wonderful satisfaction that you could hear in the voices of the spirits to this extraordinary gift, especially in this direction.

And it is my duty, above all, to thank those who have devoted their full strength to the main roles, despite the fact that they still had a great deal to do in the anthroposophical field during this period and in general over the years. It may be said that perhaps only in the anthroposophical field can the strength arise to enable Ms von Sivers to bring such great roles as those of Kleonis and Maria to the stage in two consecutive days. Such a feat is only possible when the full strength of a person is brought to bear. And with a particularly grateful heart, I would like to commemorate the actress who played Johannes Thomasius herself at this place, and it will give me particular satisfaction if this figure of Johannes Thomasius, in whom lies so very, very much of what we call anthroposophical life, if this figure remains somewhat associated with the first actress to play this Johannes Thomasius. That this has become possible at all under difficult circumstances that need not be further characterized here is due entirely to the very intensive, devoted way in which our dear Miss Waller feels about the anthroposophical cause. And if I were to tell you the difficulties that Ms. Waller had to overcome in the short time available to get into the role of Johannes Thomasius, you would probably be quite astonished. All these things that happen among us, that take place in our anthroposophical work, concern us, since we are an anthroposophical family in a spiritual sense. Therefore, we should feel obliged to those who have dedicated themselves to such a task for all of us in such a devoted way, a task that perhaps could not have been solved in this way by another person — I ask again and again to bear in mind that an outsider is not able to judge the difficult circumstances at all. And from these words you may recognize and appreciate the full extent of the dedication that the performers have developed in the last days and weeks, and how justified it is to speak of a deep thank you at this moment as well.

I would have to speak for a long, long time if I wanted to mention in detail all those who united with us in yesterday's work. Above all, let us remember the man who, when it comes to doing something in the spirit of anthroposophy in our ranks, is always there with all his heart and all his skills, let us remember our dear friend Arenson, who supported us both last year and this year with his beautiful musical skills and who made it possible for us to transition from “The Children of Lucifer” as well as from what we tried yesterday, in the appropriate places, in a dignified manner into something that can only be felt from the world of sound. And let me mention our dear artistic friends here in Munich. They have had ample opportunity during the past two days to see how we have tried to harmonize everything, even for the outward eye, with the spoken word and the music heard. They have seen how we have tried, down to the last color spot, down to the last form, to make everything a unity. If this has been possible in any way, we owe it to the sympathetic way in which our artistic friends here, Mr. Volkert, Mr. Linde, our dear Mr. Haß, have worked with all their hearts on everything that was at stake, to make what was to be done happen in a dignified way.

And such things are only possible, as I said at the beginning, when everyone works from a free and devoted heart. This year, too, we can commemorate in a very special way the work that can hardly be easily overlooked, but which took up a whole person, a whole soul and a whole heart for weeks, the work of creating all the costumes that were needed in the right way. And just as in the previous year, this was the sole responsibility of our dear Fräulein von Eckardtstein. She devoted herself to it, not only with dedication, but also, and most importantly, with the most intense understanding of every detail and of the big picture, which must never be lost sight of.

But all this is only a brief indication of what, as I said, had to be said today out of the anthroposophical sense of family, so that each and every one of us knows how this cooperation and collaboration is meant. And if you felt some satisfaction for your soul and for your mind the day before yesterday and yesterday, then let the feelings that permeate your soul flow a little to those whose names have now been mentioned and to those whom you saw on the stage as friends well known to you.

With this, if I may say so, milestone of our anthroposophical work, we wanted to show how anthroposophical ideas and anthroposophical life flow into culture. And even if humanity today is not yet inclined to incorporate into the rest of its outer culture that which can flow from spiritual life, we would at least like to show artistically how what flows and permeates our soul as thoughts and inner life can become life. Such feelings can be kindled by the forefeeling that humanity will nevertheless go from its present to a future in which it will be able to feel the outpouring of spiritual life through the spiritual and soul veins of man on the physical plane; that humanity will go towards a time in which man will feel himself as a mediator between the spiritual world and the physical world. And the events were designed to awaken this anticipation.

And when we have such anticipation, then we will also find the way to restore worn-out words, which today come to people with sentimental values that make it impossible for them to understand their full meaning, to their original light and splendor. But no one will understand the monumental nature of the words that form the starting point of the Bible if he gives the words the character they have today. We ourselves will have to ascend in thought to the heights to which we tried to have John Thomasius ascend, to where spiritual life pulses, if we want to understand physical life on earth. In a sense, a completely different language must be spoken in these spiritual worlds. But we humans must at least be able to give new values to the words that we have at our disposal here, new nuances of feeling, be able to sense something different if they are to mean what the first sentences of the Bible tell us, if we want to understand the spiritual origin of our physical world.