The Constitution of the General Anthroposophical Society

GA 260a — 4 May 1924

The Easter Event at the Goetheanum

The event in Bern was immediately followed by the one that took place at the Goetheanum itself. My topic was: Easter, a piece of mystery history. I attempted to show how the roots of Easter lie in the mysteries. How, prompted by the mysteries, festivals were celebrated in ancient times at which the image of the god of life force and beauty was sunk into the sea — or in some other way — amid expressions of mourning, and after about three days was brought back to the light of day amid joyful celebrations. Such festivals did not symbolize something remote from human beings, but rather presented the participants with the fact that, after passing through the gate of death, human beings begin a new — spiritual — life after a few days. The cult ceremony was intended to present to the human being's sensory eye what he experiences supersensually immediately after death. In the earliest times, this representation did not yet refer to the reawakening of nature in spring. It merely represented something that human beings experience as a being transcending nature.

It was only later, when the ideas present in an older instinctive spiritual vision had faded, that the connection with natural events took place. People looked at the material processes that take place in the resurrection of life in spring in order to find in them images for the resurrection of the spiritual human being after physical death.

Through the Mystery of Golgotha, what could previously only be shown in images before human perception became a historical event. This image directed people's gaze toward the cosmos, that is, toward space. And behind this direction were the experiences of the initiates in the mysteries. Through spiritual exercises, they enabled their souls to see into the spiritual world. Into the spiritual world for which the stars and their movements are the outer manifestation. There they became aware of how the form of the being that humans carry with them into physical existence on Earth at birth — or conception — is influenced by the forces that form the spiritual part of the Moon. But they also recognized how the spiritual part of the Sun intervenes in humans during their earthly life in such a way that they can transform what was formed at birth. Through their initiation, they felt themselves transported with their souls to the sun.

What they gained through this transport to the sun, human beings have been able to gain since the Mystery of Golgotha by directing their soul's gaze to this mystery. Previously, this gaze was directed toward the spatial cosmos; since the founding of Christianity, time has taken the place of space. The soul's gaze can be directed toward what happened at Golgotha. What previously had to be sought outside the earth could now be found in earthly events themselves. The ancient mysteries lose their sunlike brilliance before the radiant star of Golgotha. They find their fulfillment in it.

To look into the world-historical destiny of the ancient mysteries means to deepen the meaning of Easter, which for contemporary human beings can represent their demise and new dawn. In striving for this deepening, anthroposophy itself becomes imbued with the idea of resurrection; it is a message of this resurrection. As such, it becomes a matter of the heart rather than a matter of ideas. In this way, the Goetheanum's Easter event sought to carry forward the impulse of the Christmas Conference.

We had the great satisfaction that, despite the unfavorable circumstances, this event was able to bring together numerous members of the Society at the Goetheanum. May this be followed by the further satisfaction that the visitors to our Easter celebration will carry what was intended at the Goetheanum to the local branches of the Anthroposophical Society. This will bring the unified spirit into the Society that it needs and that the Christmas Conference sought to inspire in the hearts of its members.