Our Dead

GA 261 — 10 January 1915, Basel

Address at the Cremation of Lina Grosheintz-Rohrer

The soul whose passing we mourn today showed the full, most noble strength to exchange this earthly life with that other into which she was called to enter. And the friend was ready to receive the revelations of that other world, as she was always ready to receive the revelations of this earthly world. We, my dear mourners, raise our souls to this soul, in union with all the loved ones, in the pain for the dearly departed here. We sympathetically unite our souls with the souls of our dear relatives and look up to the soul that has departed from this earthly world and its way of life. And when we try to explore, feelingly, discerningly, what lived in this soul, when we imagine it free from all that was earthly, when we want to listen to it where it speaks from its deepest conviction, from its deepest feeling and will, then we, my dear mourners, may well feel as if we were hearing this dear, this powerful soul speak words like these:

In world-wide expanses I will bear
My feeling heart, that it may become warm
In the fire of sacred activity. In world thoughts I will weave
My own thinking, that it may become clear
In the light of eternal becoming-life; I will dive into the depths of souls
With devoted contemplation, that it may become strong
For the true goals of human activity; In God's peace I strive so
With life struggles and worries,
My self to the higher self preparing; Longing for a joyful peace,
Sensing the world in my own being,
I would fulfill my duty to humanity; Then I may live in anticipation
of my soul's star,
which in the spiritual realm grants me the place.

A life full of work, a life full of strength, a life full of lively concern and human duties, which she was assigned in her earthly life, in her present phase of life, has come to an end in our beloved friend, and in such a way that one word comes to mind and to the soul when this life is to be characterized by the nature of her personality, a word in which much, much can be included. But nothing, I think, is in this word that should not be included when looking at the personality who has left us: an “anima magna” in the noblest sense, a beautiful soul in the best sense of the word, and a soul that knew how to pour out what radiated in her in glorious beauty for all those who were close to her or came into the slightest contact with her, so that one became partakers of the love, the goodwill, the strength that emanated from her. Everyone around her could perceive the strengthening and revelation of intimate soul beauty.

Such a soul has passed from us, and we feel our relationship to her, which is truly felt, like the setting of a sun that we have so gladly seen around us.

But again, my dear mourning friends, when we turn our spiritual gaze to this evening of life after a life of work, we are overcome by the most heartfelt consolation from this soul itself, consolation in many respects.

One can think of the life ideal of many ancient souls who, when they came to the realization of the evening of their lives, said that they would not want to come to this evening of their lives without the soul being able to enter in a corresponding way into the spiritual worlds into which they are to submerge when the gate of physical life is closed. Countless spirits in ancient times felt the same way: May I be granted an evening of life so that I may go, feeling, into the spiritual world. Those who had not yet taken in the feeling of their connection with the spiritual world felt, as it were, their purpose in life slipping away. What a beautiful feeling and sensation this woman had been given in what she had around her in her old age, and that is why such a purpose in life, which brought her closer to the spiritual world. It is hard to imagine a more beautiful entry into and life in the spiritual world than was the case with our friend.

When you look back on her life, you see a life dedicated to taking care of the smallest, most insignificant things in life, that powerfully wanted things from the details of life and yet was again inspired to embrace all the details of life in a grand sweep. who had the joy and the good fortune to approach this soul, it was exemplary through its noble, through its strong activity, exemplary through the care in the individual, exemplary in the most loyal action.

And then again, this soul, who has fulfilled her life through work, effort and worry, felt the need to live and immerse her soul in the revelations of spiritual life. She also had this need in an exemplary, truly exemplary way. My dear suffering friends and friends of my dear friend, from the revelation of spiritual life to which we profess, one receives a conviction for spiritual knowledge, admittedly through a saying of Goethe. But standing in this conviction, one feels the truth of Goethe's saying so strongly that one can hardly feel the truth of this saying in any other field: “What is fruitful is alone true!"

Oh, how often one had to think of our dear departed when one contemplated her strong, exemplary life! In her, the connection with the spiritual world proved truly fruitful. With her whole soul and her whole heart she stood in the elements that take hold of us and flow through us when we seek the connection with the spiritual worlds. She repeatedly felt imbued, flooded and strengthened when she really wanted to experience the connection with the spiritual world, and then the forces flowed into her physical upright posture.

Truly, our spiritual current, my dear friends, feels fortunate to be able to be united with such souls. And it can do so, for on the one hand it must tell itself that it receives from these souls as much as a glorious gift of right living as it gives; and on the other hand, when it can be seen what spiritual science can be to such souls, spiritual science also feels strengthened and invigorated, and strength flows to it from such souls. That is why such souls are living stars in the midst of our spiritual current, and we look up to them as we would to certain stars. Because we look up to such living stars, we are comforted in our pain, and we feel this comfort even when we can no longer see the loving eye or hear the dear voice. If it can be a consolation for the dear ones that many souls united with our friend in true friendship unite in outer pain and mourning, then they can truly be sure of this consolation; they can be sure of the consolation that comes from the awareness, at least the outer one, the consolation that turns to a feeling that can be truly consoling, especially for such a soul.

We will consider and feel: Now she has left us, now she will no longer reach out to us, now we will no longer feel the warmth of her heart, no longer have her benevolent gaze resting on us, now we will no longer see her strength in the physical world. When we feel all this, we turn to the other feeling, especially when we are faced with such a soul, to the feeling that this soul is an infinitely precious gift of our life on earth. And let us consider every moment in which she was allowed to devote herself to us in this physical world, which we think back on with love and loyalty, as a gain, and then let us consider every moment in which we can no longer have her in the physical world, as such, in which we want to hold fast to the love and devotion that she so richly deserved.

Let us no longer look at the moments when she will be physically gone from us, but let us look at the moments she gave us and let us cherish those moments in our memories. They will be rich and full of important things. Such was this soul that the memory of her can be more than abundant. If we do not find only sorrow in their absence, we will find strength and power among the many other things. The sight of them shows us a soul in which the value penetrates into one's own soul, into the anima.

Souls of this kind are among those through whom the gods reveal how much they love the world. Lives that flow in this way, blessing, full of work, full of devotion in love, which are then also allowed to reap the fruits in children and children's children, and which, in the insight into this satisfaction from their earthly life, are allowed to look within themselves, such souls are the ones through whom the gods reveal their love for the world to man. And when such a soul departs from us, then our own souls feel as if they are united in spirit with the spirit that flows through all worlds, with the living force that goes through all life. Then we are closer to understanding these words, which are given to the human race, than we are in the ordinary moments of life, when we feel united with the noble soul that hovers over our life, the fleeting life, and then we do not say in a different sense than usual; Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth.

A sense of the world permeated our friend's soul, a sense of the world that constantly spoke from the heartfelt interest she had in intellectual life. And, my dear friends in mourning, you have to resort to the words of a great ancient sage if you want to find words that shape that which filled this anima magna:

“No longer shall your breath alone be in harmony with the surrounding air, but henceforth your mind shall also be in harmony with the rational essence that surrounds everything, for the power of reason is poured out upon us all and permeates everyone who wants to draw it to themselves, just as the air permeates those who can breathe it.”

This world view of the ancient Roman sage lived in our friend's heart. But in addition, she had a living understanding of the union of the individual human soul with the whole; she had everything that the human soul can fulfill in our time, when it seeks the path through the earthly shell up into the spiritual worlds. And when she felt this sense of life in our sense, our friend, that the spirit surrounds us and wants to be breathed in like the air - truly, honestly and sincerely, lovingly and urgently, she often felt through her soul: “I was born of God” - of God, with all that my physical shell, my earthly life, has done.

But then, when such a soul rises into the spiritual world, when it seeks that which can shine forth from the spiritual worlds, then, in its search in the spiritual worlds, an inkling, a belief, a knowledge of those worlds arises in it, which are exalted above space and time, above birth and death and above the stars. Then that feeling begins, which the old Roman sage could not yet have, that feeling that truly makes the sight of death a new birth, that makes the sight of death appear as the birth of the soul for the spiritual worlds.

The soul here felt surrounded by reason, by spirit, by world thoughts in the earthly world. So the soul, which can feel, which has been initiated, feels the soul of the friend. When she delves into her reasons, she feels how she finds the way to the world that is beyond space and time, in which physical death forms the entrance to the connection with the Christ, who reveals Himself through the mystery of Golgotha, who reveals Himself anew in the understanding soul in every moment. And then such a soul finds the true conviction, which no soul can find more sincerely than the soul that hastened ahead of us, the word: In Christ we die. - Everything she gave us in her life, when we saw her among us, for years and especially in the last times, is an affirmation of her being imbued with the Christ impulse. This is an affirmation of what she felt when she constantly turned to the mystery of Golgotha, the wisdom that can flow into all human souls that want to receive it. Thus we find her death, which for her was consciously a new birth, in intimate union with the Christ. She died in the Christ.

But that gives us the strength of thought to know that we are united with her in spirit, to find the main consolation beyond all pain and grief: As true as she hastened into the spiritual world, clothed in the luminous and powerful thought, “In the Christ I shall resurrect,” so true as the word, the powerful word that resounded from her, will it arise in her soul, and we shall resurrect with her and be united with her.

In this union, my dear mourners, we shall plant in our souls the thoughts that should be directed, as often as we are allowed, to the soul of our dear friend, to the exemplary way in which she lived out her time on earth for us, to the strength and heavenly light that radiates from her. When we turn our thoughts to her in loyalty, we vow that when we leave her earthly shell, we want to feel that so strongly in all of us, with our best thoughts united in her, forever, until we see her through the power of the spirit in which we want to live intimately united with her.

Because this soul was so deeply imbued with this spirit, inspired by the longing for the light that speaks from the spiritual worlds, it is, my dear friends, that when I tried to feel so united this morning with the soul hurrying into the spiritual world, that I could hear the words that seem to me that soul would say if it followed the purest impulse of its self, followed that which radiated from the star of life as long as it dwelled among us.

They shall become conscious in our hearts, these words, which seem to me to be words that the hurrying soul calls out to us in this last moment when we are allowed to dwell with its earthly shell, calling out to us, admonishing us, worrying about our own path in our spiritual world. These are words through which we ourselves will feel the strength to sense our unity with the soul and to find our way into the spiritual world. It seems as if this soul were speaking to us in the words that we want to carry faithfully in everlasting remembrance of her:

In the world's expanse I will carry
My feeling heart, that it may become warm
In the fire of sacred power; In world thoughts I will weave
My own thinking, that it may become clear
In the light of eternal becoming-life; In the depths of souls I will dive
devoted thinking, that it may become strong
for the true goals of human endeavor; In the peace of God, I strive
with life's struggles and worries,
preparing my self for the higher self; Longing for a peaceful peace,
sensing the cosmic existence in my own existence,
I would like to fulfill my human duty; Then I may live in anticipation
of my soul's star,
which grants me a place in the spiritual realm.