The History of the Esoteric School 1904–1914, Volume One

GA 264

Supplement Concerning the Masters

The Masters of Wisdom and of the Harmony of Sensations in Rudolf Steiner's Work

Hella Wiesberger

At the first general assembly of the German Section in October 1903, Rudolf Steiner outlined his future teaching program as “occult historical research”, part of which was the teaching of the great spiritual leaders of humanity. For, according to the aspects of the great trinity of body, soul and spirit, occult historical research will show how the physical existence of humanity is determined by the great cosmic forces of nature; what role the personal element plays in history; how the universal spirit of the universe intervenes in human destinies by pouring its life into the higher self of a great human leader and thereby communicating it to all humanity:

"For this is the way this higher life takes: it flows into the higher selves of the leading spirits, and they share it with their brothers. From embodiment to embodiment, people's higher selves develop and learn more and more to make their own selves missionaries of the divine plan of the world. Through occult historical research, one will recognize how a human leader develops to the point where he can take on a divine mission. One will realize how Buddha, Zarathustra, and Christ came to their missions.“¹

At the next General Assembly in October 1904, the topic was taken up again by the leaders of humanity, who repeatedly pointed out that in order to understand it, a distinction had to be made between masters of the past, the present and the future.

The masters of the past, the present and the future

After such references in the lectures of October 7 and 24, 1904, this fact was presented in detail on October 28, 1904, on the grounds that although it was already known to most people, it was necessary to keep repeating that

"In the course of our fifth root race, that is, in the time from the sinking of the Atlantean race until the next root race, a highly important step will be taken in the evolution of humanity, in that, namely, out of humanity itself, the leaders of humanity, the Manus, will arise. All the great leaders, the Manus, who have helped humanity during the earlier root races and given it great impulses, have not completed their development purely on earth, but partly on other celestial bodies, and have thus already brought with them from other worlds what they had to give to humanity in the way of great impulses for this earth. The Manus of the Lemurian and Atlantean races, as well as the Stamm-Manu of our fifth root race, are superhuman individualities who have undergone their great schooling on other planets in order to become the leaders of humanity. In contrast, during our fifth root race, highly developed individuals are emerging within our own humanity who, from the sixth root race onwards, will be able to become the leaders of humanity. In particular, the main leader of the sixth root race will be a human being like us, only one of the most advanced - indeed, the most advanced of all human beings. He will be an entity that began its development at the time when, in the middle of the Lemurian race, human incarnation began at all. This entity will have always been a human being among humans, only able to progress faster, and will have gone through all stages of human development. This will be the basic character of the Manu of the sixth root race. Such entities must pass through the most varied initiations, must have been initiated repeatedly. Therefore, the fifth root race has always had initiated people since its inception, people who were initiated in that direction, so to speak, that they could go their own voluntary way. This was not the case during the entire Lemurian period and also during the entire Atlantean period. Those who helped humanity, who governed and directed it, who were statesmen and leaders of great religious communities, were under the influence of higher beings. During the Lemurian and Atlantean races, they were directly dependent on those higher beings who had undergone their development on other planets. It was only in the fifth root race that humanity was released. There we have initiates who, although they are connected with the higher entities, are not given such far-reaching advice that they are fully developed, but the initiates of the fifth root race are given more and more freedom in the details. In general, directives are given, not only to the initiates, but also to those who are inspired by them. They are given impulses, but in such a way that it is their own spirituality from which they have to carry out the things.” (Berlin, October 28, 1904)

A few months after this account, it is emphasized once again that in the fifth root race - the post-Atlantean period - the human leaders and masters are to emerge from the human race itself:

"Now, one who has passed through all phases of humanity more quickly becomes a master and rises to become a leader of humanity.” (Berlin, May 5, 1905)

Such people will then be the “true” masters of wisdom and of the harmony of feelings (Düsseldorf, March 7, 1907). The direction in which this development must be striven for can be seen from the following statement:

"Our task today is to grasp the occult in the Manas, in the purest element of thought. To grasp the spiritual in this finest distillate of the brain is the real mission of our time. To make this thought so powerful that it has something of occult power is the task set for us, in order to be able to fulfill our place in the future.” (Düsseldorf, March 7, 1907)

The same is expressed in the answer to the question once asked as to where the initiates of humanity actually are when a work like his is at stake:

“Now it is a matter of the higher truths being grasped by human thinking. If you were to meet these initiates today, you might not find in them what you are seeking. Their task lay more in earlier incarnations. Now human thinking must be spiritualized.”

From the twelve-, seven- and fourfold activity of the masters

Up until the separation of the first esoteric working group from the E.S.T. in 1907, Rudolf Steiner named four masters who are particularly associated with the Theosophical movement: the two masters of the East, Kuthumi and Morya, and the two masters of the West, Christian Rosenkreutz and Master Jesus. After the separation, he only spoke of the two masters of the West.

If we try to answer the question of why only four or two masters were named, while according to other statements there are twelve who form the great white lodge (Cologne, December 3, 1905), and it is also stated that there have never been more than seven initiates at the same time (Berlin, October 10, 1905), it becomes clear that that the numbers 12, 7, 4 are based on certain laws. First of all, there is a certain ratio of 12 to 7, which is found in notes from a private session with Marie von Sivers (Berlin, July 3, 1904) as follows:

"If we imagine the evolution of a planetary system, we must consider the following. Evolution takes place in such a way that two always alternate for each being: evolution and involution. Now we must imagine the seven evolving and involutionizing each other. On the next planet, each of the rulers has to go up one level. 8 is the evolved 7. As they develop further, they develop into the others. When they arrive at 7, they cannot go any further. If 7 became 8, the process would already have happened; it is nothing but a repetition of the first, 7 on a different level. As we move up, we see that the leaders themselves change. We get 12 regents and a 13th, superfluous one. This 13th brings the whole planet into a state as it was in the beginning, only into a higher one. We have to conclude with 12. So that in each constitution of a planetary chain we have not seven but twelve exalted leading spirits. Of these, only the first has the eighth not in action, and so on. (Our concepts belong to the rupically mental world; these entities lie beyond our concepts, so that it is not a matter of a coming forth, but of relationships - timeless).² These beings have been recognized as the 12 regents in the symbols, for example of the zodiac, through which the sun passes. Corresponding to the stages of the macrocosm is also the increase in consciousness of microcosmic development. Thus the number 12 has always been decisive and there have been 12 leading spirits everywhere: 12 tribes of Israel, 12 apostles, 12 knights of the Grail. Thus, both macrocosmically and microcosmically, 12 is the sacred number that underlies everything. 7 are in action, 5 have other tasks. For the physical planet, only 7 are considered, therefore only 7 of the 12 principles of man are taught.

This description, as well as the answer to the question of May 29, 1915 (p. 201), that of the twelve leading spirits, only seven are considered for the physical plan, explains why the Theosophical Society spoke of seven masters: the Masters Kuthumi, Morya, Jesus, Christian Rosenkreutz (also known as the Count of Saint-Germain after his incarnation in the 18th century), Hilarion, Serapis and the so-called Venetian Master. These seven were understood to be the seven emanations of the Logos, and each Master was ascribed a particular mode of working according to his ray. For example, it was said of Christian Rosenkreutz that he worked through ceremonial magic as a representative of the seventh ray. Rudolf Steiner apparently rejected this, because in the lecture Berlin, June 20, 1912, there is a remark that the individuality of Christian Rosenkreutz, whom “we recognize as the leader of the occult movement into the future,” is also much misunderstood by occultists and that he will certainly never develop his authority in the world through an “outer cultus.”

However, Rudolf Steiner also spoke of a sevenfold activity of the masters, as can be seen from the account given in Berlin, July 3, 1904, and the answer to a question given on May 29, 1915. When asked about this sevenfold structure from a different quarter, he is reported as having replied: “Two work in the east, two in the west, two in the center, but one goes through”.³ The expression “in the center” does not refer to Central Europe, but to the Mediterranean region as the center of the world; from a global perspective, Central Europe belongs to the western world, which is why Rudolf Steiner always spoke of the two masters of the West as the ones who are decisive for Central Europe.

If we now look at the various details about the incarnations of the masters, these could appear contradictory at first glance, when on the one hand it is said that they have already been taken from the world as highly developed individuals, and on the other hand there is talk of specific incarnations, of certain masters with a special mission, even to the extent that their physical body is preserved so that death does not occur at all (see page 205). This apparent contradiction, however, only points to the manifold and complicated way in which the masters work, as well as to the degrees of mastery, as they have often been presented, for example, by Rudolf Steiner at the Boddhisattva-Buddha levels.⁴ The following two statements, for example, point to the as-well-as in the question of incarnation or non-incarnation:

“As a rule, the masters are not exactly historical personalities; they sometimes incarnate in historical personalities when it is necessary; but it is a sacrifice to a certain extent. The degree of their consciousness is no longer compatible with working for themselves. And working for themselves is already maintaining the mere name.” (Berlin, December 23, 1904) "When the present-day leaders of humanity go about in the world in their human guise, they are not recognized in the outer exoteric world. And if we speak of the Masters of the Wisdom and of the Harmony of Feelings on the basis of spiritual science, then people would often be amazed at the simple, unpretentious humanity with which these Masters of the Wisdom and of the Harmony of Feelings come to all countries. They are present on the physical plane. But they do not give the most important teachings on the physical plane, but... on the spiritual plane. And anyone who wants to hear them and receive teachings from them must not only have access to them as to their physical, carnal body, but as to their spiritual form.

The latter statement in particular also indicates that it is advisable to exercise caution when judging and thinking further about Rudolf Steiner's statements about the incarnations of the masters, especially when the information has been handed down only inadequately and not truly authentically. This is because the masters do not work only in physical incarnation, but also through incorporation, inspiration or even astral appearance. This is indicated by the note handed down from an esoteric lesson in which the way Master Kuthumi works was discussed and it was said “that this incarnation was not in a particular personality, but that his power was at work here and there.” (Berlin, December 13, 1905, p. 213). It is obvious that these are occult phenomena that are difficult or impossible for the ordinary conscious mind to grasp, which is why the different ways in which the Mahatmas appear in H.P. Blavatsky and others in the T.S. have led to great misunderstandings. However, Rudolf Steiner did not doubt the possibility of materialization either, because Friedrich Rittelmeyer related that Rudolf Steiner once spoke to him about it:

“I vividly remember a conversation after a Berlin branch evening. Dr. Steiner told of the previous incorporations of the masters. ‘Someone enters the room. They shake hands and talk to him, he leaves the room again, but you won't notice that he leaves the house’.”

Friedrich Rittelmeyer also reports, however, that however willingly Rudolf Steiner answered his questions, he gradually distracted him in two directions: on the one hand, to spiritualize thinking, which is the most important task today, and on the other hand, to the historical context.

The Seven Great Mysteries of Life and the Masters

If, in relation to the work of the Masters in humanity, we move from the question of the ratio of twelve to seven to the question of the ratio of seven to four, we encounter an even more complicated problem. To make it clear, we must start from the letter to Günther Wagner of December 24, 1903. This letter answers the request for a more detailed explanation of what had been hinted at at the first general assembly of the German section, which had taken place in October 1903 in Berlin, namely that each of the seven races had a secret to solve. The answer to Günther Wagner begins with a sentence from the “Secret Doctrine” by H.P. Blavatsky:

“Of the seven truths or revelations, only four have been handed down to us, since we are still in the fourth round.”

This sentence comes from Blavatsky's commentary on the ten stanzas from the so-called Book of Dzyan, which, as a theosophical cosmogenesis, form the core of the “Secret Doctrine”. The rest of the content is a single commentary on them. Although Rudolf Steiner was generally very critical of H.P. Blavatsky's commentaries, he always spoke with the greatest appreciation of the Dzyan verses themselves (e.g. in the lecture Düsseldorf, April 12, 1909). He once translated the first verse from English into German himself as follows.⁵

"The Eternal Mother, clothed in her eternally invisible robes, had once again slumbered for seven eternities. There was no time, for she lay asleep in the boundless bosom of duration. Universal thinking was not, for there was no Ah-hi to contain it. The seven wise (ways) to bliss were not. The great causes of suffering were not, for there was nothing that could have become entangled in them. Darkness alone filled the infinite universe, for Father (Law, Necessity), Mother (World Substance) and Son (Lawful World, Substance, Cosmos) were as one, and the Son had not yet awakened to a new cycle and pilgrimage. The seven sublime entities and the seven truths had ceased to be, and the universe, the son of necessity, had plunged into Paranishpanna to be exhaled by that which is and is not. Nothing (overseen) was. The causes of existence were extinguished; the visible that was and the invisible that is remained in eternal non-being - the One Being (overseen). Only this One Form of existence (of being) stretched endlessly, without limit, without cause, in dream-like sleep; and life wove unconsciously (blissfully) in universal space, through and through that omnipresence, which is felt only by the opened eye of the Dangma. But where was Dangma when the A-laya of the universe was in Paramartha and the great cycle was Anupadaka? Ah-hi = soul of the Dhyan-Choans
Paranishpanna = perfection
Dangma = seer
A-laya = soul of the world
Paramartha = accomplishment (parama = above all, artha = grasp)
Anupadaka = parentless.

H.P. Blavatsky's commentary on the sixth sentence of the first Dzyan verse, to which Rudolf Steiner refers in his letter of December 24, 1903, to Günther Wagner, reads in full:⁶

"The ‘seven exalted rulers’ are the seven creative spirits, the Dhyan-Choans, who correspond to the Hebrew Elohim. It is the same hierarchy of archangels to which St. Michael, St. Gabriel and others belong in the Christian theogony. Only, while St. Michael, for example, is only allowed to guard the promontories and gulfs in dogmatic Latin theology, in the esoteric system the Dhyanis in turn guard one of the rounds and the great root races of our planetary chain. It is further said that they send forth their Bodhisattvas, the human representatives of the Dhyani Buddhas during each round and race. Of the “seven truths” or revelations, or rather revealed secrets, only four have been handed down to us, because we are still in the fourth round and the world has had only four Buddhas so far. This is a very complicated question and will be dealt with in detail later.

In this respect, Hindus and Buddhists say: “There are only four truths and four Vedem.” For a similar reason, Irenaeus insisted on the necessity of four Gospels. But since every new root race must receive its revelation and its revealers at the beginning of a round, the next round will bring the fifth, the following the sixth, and so on.

Of the seven truths or revelations, only four have been given to the world so far, according to H.P. Blavatsky – confirmed by Rudolf Steiner's letter of December 24, 1903 to Günther Wagner. And because every revelation needs its revelator, the world has had only four Buddhas. Whether and in what way these four Buddhas are identical with the four masters of whom Rudolf Steiner spoke within the Esoteric School must remain an open question, although he once equated the two ranks of “master” and “Buddha” (Lugano, September 17, 1911).

This immediately raises the question of the relationship between the masters and the buddhas or bodhisattvas, for Rudolf Steiner speaks of both as the greatest spiritual teachers of humanity and of both as forming a twelve-fold unity whose task it is to regulate ongoing development and to teach the significance of the Christ impulse for human development. The prerequisite for a closer study of this question is certainly that the terms Master, Buddha, and Bodhisattva are not proper names, but ranks, or dignities in the hierarchy of adeptness, which can be achieved by a human individuality with appropriate development. In the lecture Berlin, October 1, 1905, the term Bodhisattva is defined as a person who has absorbed all earthly experiences so that he knows how to utilize every thing and can thus work creatively. The wise men of the earth are not yet Bodhisattvas, because there are still things in life that even the wise cannot yet find their way around in. After a long period of working as a teacher of humanity with the rank of a Bodhisattva, he ascends to the dignity of a Buddha; he no longer needs to incarnate, but works purely spiritually for further development.

Since Rudolf Steiner calls the same individualities, for example Zarathustra, sometimes a Bodhisattva, sometimes a Master, and sometimes equates the Mastership and Buddhahood (Lugano, September 17, 1911), it may well be assumed that the same ranks are meant by the great masters of wisdom and harmony of feelings, which in the Oriental tradition of wisdom are understood as the Bodhisattva and the Buddha. But the fact that an extraordinarily complicated structure arises from the interaction of beings from the higher hierarchies, which comes into play for the realization of the concrete interrelations, has been presented by Rudolf Steiner on various occasions.⁷

An understanding of the relationship of seven to four, which H.P. Blavatsky already described as very complicated, only opens up through Rudolf Steiner's descriptions of the so-called “seven great mysteries of life”. They are none other than the “seven truths or revelations, or rather revealed mysteries”, as they were described by H.P. Blavatsky. In his letter, Rudolf Steiner also calls them the seven “esoteric root truths”. In the notes from the lecture in Berlin on October 28, 1903, it says:

"We speak of seven great mysteries. There are seven great mysteries that reveal the seven great phases of life. They are called the ‘ineffable’.” (Berlin, October 28, 1903).

In the General Assembly that took place ten days before this lecture, Rudolf Steiner had already hinted at this “in the sense of a certain occult tradition” (letter of December 24, 1903). This tradition had already been expressed in writing by the English occultist C. G. Harrison. In the book “The Transcendental Universe”, London 1894,⁸ From the standpoint of traditional European-Christian occultism, he critically examines the theosophy of H.P. Blavatsky's Theosophy, but admits that its “Secret Doctrine” contains very valuable information about prehistoric civilizations and religions, alludes to certain secrets “whose existence itself was not suspected” and that some of them “have been tested and found correct by a process known to occultists.” (1st lecture). In the sixth lecture, Harrison then lists the “seven great mysteries.” It is said that they apply to all levels of consciousness and cannot be explained in words, but require the application of a symbolic system, the nature of which he is not at liberty to discuss. In a footnote they are listed as follows: “1. Abyss, 2. Number, 3. Elective Affinity, 4. Birth and Death, 5. Evil, 6. The Word, 7. Bliss”.

In the very fragmentary notes from the first years of Rudolf Steiner's spiritual scientific lecture work, these seven secrets are usually only partially mentioned and the name Harrison never appears. Even in later, even more concrete descriptions, they are only partially treated, so that it is not recognizable that it is a seven-part whole.⁹ Only once are all seven secrets found in the same terms as in Harrison's list. This is in the Paris lectures of May/June 1906. In the lecture of June 13, 1906, it says:

"There are seven secrets of life that have never been spoken of outside the occult brotherhoods until today. Only in the present era is it possible to speak of them exoterically. They are also called the seven “inexpressible” or “unspeakable” secrets.¹⁰

These are the secrets:

1. The secret of the abyss.
2. The secret of the number. (It can be studied in Pythagorean philosophy).
3. The secret of alchemy. (This can be understood through the works of Paracelsus and Jakob Böhme).
4. The mystery of birth and death.¹¹
5. The mystery of evil, which deals with the Apocalypse.
6. The mystery of the Word, the Logos.
7. The mystery of bliss; it is the most profoundly hidden.

The fact that these seven great mysteries or esoteric root truths are not just principal concepts that “run like leitmotifs through the entire esoteric movement” (Paris, May 5, 1913), but that they point to high spiritual beings, is clear from notes that Marie von Sivers made during a private lesson (Berlin, July 2, 1904). According to this, the seven possible relationships that the Trinity of Father, Son and Spirit enters into are to be understood as entities, and the designations given for these seven possible relational entities correspond in turn to those for the seven secrets of life. In the first lecture cycle on spiritual cosmology (October 17 to November 10, 1904), there is a fundamental discussion of how all development is determined by the three principles of consciousness, life and form, and how each of these three principles has to pass through seven stages or phases. The stages or phases of life mentioned in it correspond in turn to the seven great mysteries of life. Their realization and the soul experiences associated with them constitute the two halves of the initiation and thus the content of anthroposophy as a modern science of initiation (Dornach, December 30, 1914).

While the seven stages of consciousness and form are repeatedly encountered as the seven principles of the structure of man and the world in Rudolf Steiner's spiritual science, this is not the case to the same extent with the seven phases of cosmic life. This is apparently due to the fact that the planetary spirit keeps its life of feeling to itself (Berlin, November 3, 1904). This is presumably why the seven secrets of life are also called the “unspeakable” ones, the description of which must be very difficult, as indicated, for example, in the lectures Munich, December 4, 1907, and Dornach, December 30, 1914.

The most decisive clue to the question of the ratio of seven to four, both in relation to the seven mysteries and to their revealers, the masters, is given in the notes from the lecture Berlin, November 1, 1904. According to these notes, the main characteristic of the seven mysteries of life is that they apply to all developmental cycles because they are always repeated “in every round and racial development, also in all other cyclic developments, including the human being. This reference makes it possible to understand why, according to the letter of December 24, 1903 to Günther Wagner, “the fourth of the... seven truths goes back to seven esoteric root truths and that of these partial truths (the fourth considered as a whole) one is delivered to each race, as a rule.”

From this, three things can be deduced:

1. The seven root truths or secrets apply primarily to the great developmental cycles of the planetary chain Saturn-Sun-Moon-Earth-Jupiter-Venus-Vulcan.

2. The fourth secret of birth and death applies to the entire development of the earth.

3. Since the seven mysteries are always repeated, they also apply to all sevenfold subdivisions of the overall development of the earth, but as partial truths of the overarching fourth mystery (see, for example, Dornach, November 3 and 4, 1917).

The question arises: how does Rudolf Steiner's work and activity relate to the seven great mysteries of life?

Rudolf Steiner's work and the fifth of the seven great mysteries of life

Since the seven great mysteries of life apply to all sevenfold developmental cycles, the fifth mystery, that of evil, must become decisive for our immediate present as the fifth post-Atlantic cultural epoch. Not as a whole, but as a partial truth anticipated, for the fourth mystery still applies as the overriding principle for the overall development of the earth. The fifth secret will reveal itself more strongly than it is doing today in the fifth cultural epoch and in its full power at the fifth stage of the earth's life, when the earth will have developed to the fifth planetary stage, the consciousness of Jupiter. (Munich, January 16, 1908).

If it is stated in the letter of December 24, 1903 to Günther Wagner that Theosophy, the partial Theosophy that lies, for example, in Blavatsky's “Secret Doctrine” and its “Esotericism” (the third volume of the “Secret Doctrine”), is a sum of partial truths of the fifth secret, this raises the serious question: What can evil have to do with Theosophy?

This question finds a certain answer in the spiritual-scientific view of good and evil. According to this, the recognition of good and evil in our cultural epoch is bound up with the recognition of the spiritual developmental impulses of the human being and the cosmos. (Dornach, September 28, 1918). Evil occurs when the individual or the community strays from harmony with the progressive impulses of the cosmos. There is no such thing as evil in itself. All evil is not absolutely real, but arises from the fact that something that is good in some way is used in the world in an inappropriate way. This turns a good into an evil. (Munich, August 25, 1913).

Another concept of evil was decisive for the previous cultural epoch, the Greco-Latin period, because it was the fourth epoch under the fourth secret, that of birth and death. This can be seen from the following modification of the seven stages of initiation. The Christian-Gnostic path of initiation, as it was decisive in the fourth epoch, had the seven stages: foot washing, flagellation, crowning with thorns, crucifixion, mystical death, entombment, ascension. The Christian-Rosicrucian path of initiation, which is decisive for the fifth cultural epoch, has the seven stages: Study for True Self-Knowledge, Imagination, Learning Occult Writing or Inspired Knowledge, Rhythmization of Life (Preparation of the Philosopher's Stone), the Correspondence between Microcosm and Macrocosm (Knowledge of the Connection between Man and the World), Dwelling or Immersing Oneself in the Macrocosm, and Divine Bliss. Now, in both paths of initiation, the experience of evil lies on the fifth step, but in the Christian-Gnostic path of the fourth epoch it was connected with the experience of the mystical death as the so-called “descent into hell”. In the path of initiation of our fifth epoch, on the other hand, one gets to know true good as the correspondence between microcosm and macrocosm and evil as the respective deviation from this correspondence on the fifth initiation level. Since the path of initiation that is decisive for an epoch is always connected with the forces that are to be developed in the respective epoch in connection with the seven secrets of life, anthroposophy was bound to become the science of the correspondences or non-correspondences of microcosm and macrocosm. The question of good and evil must therefore be resolved today through the knowledge of the right correspondence.

Seen in this light, the statement in the letter of December 24, 1903, that Theosophy is a sum of partial truths of the fifth secret, can be explained to mean that only the double meaning of the fifth step of the modern path of initiation can be meant: the correspondences of microcosm and macrocosm on the one hand, evil as the aberrations of this on the other. Thus, in the spirit of the fifth epoch, knowledge of good and evil, which in the fourth epoch had a more fixed, more spatial character, takes on a more fluid character. It becomes more and more a question of recognizing the right impulses of time, or, to put it another way, the right impulses of cosmic-historical development. This developmental step from a more spatial to a more temporally shaped knowledge is based on a certain lawfulness, to which Rudolf Steiner once drew attention when he spoke about the relationship of the first four cultural epochs to the three that followed. He said:

“When a spatial relationship is to become temporal, it happens in such a way that it happens in the ratio of four to seven, that the tetrad expands into the heptad... The ratio of four to seven is based on a very specific law.” (Berlin, October 28, 1904)

The fact that a completely different position must be taken to the question of good and evil than had been correct for the preceding epochs, is also expressed in the following entry in a notebook:¹²

"The masters are not a bulwark against evil, but guides to the absorption of evil. We should not exclude evil, but rather take it up and use it in the sphere of good. The lion's rage is evil only as long as it is used selfishly by the lion; if a ruler could appropriate the lion's rage and use it to create welfare institutions, it would be good. Therefore, evil is to be recognized as non-real. There is no evil. Evil is only a displaced good. Only with this realization is spiritual alchemy possible.

In connection with the seven great mysteries of life, it can be said in the sense of H.P. Blavatsky that “each new root race at the beginning of a round must receive its revelation and its revelators.” Rudolf Steiner in his work can only be understood as the first proclaimer of the fifth esoteric root truth, the fifth of the seven great mysteries of life, and in its double meaning: the correspondence between microcosm and macrocosm on the one hand, and the aberrations from it as evil on the other.

In the written records from the early years of his spiritual scientific lectures, the proclamation of the mystery of evil appears only in hints, but already in its full and profound significance. For example, the report of Rudolf Steiner's remarks at the first general assembly of the German Section of the T.S. (Berlin, October 18, 1903) that among the many reasons that led to the founding of the Theosophical Society as an “occultly powerful necessity”, one of the most important is that each human race is given “a secret” and that we, as the fifth race, are at the fifth secret, which, however, cannot be pronounced today. The text continues:

"We are gradually living into it. What kind of secret it is, is already hinted at by Paul, who was an initiate. It will only be revealed in the course of the development of our race. A premature guessing of this secret through purely intellectual abilities would mean an indescribable danger for humanity. Since such a guess has almost been made twice already¹³ and will happen again in the foreseeable future, the great teachers of humanity have brought about the theosophical movement. Humanity is to be prepared for the great truth. Theosophy is working towards a certain point in time. A core is to be formed that understands this truth when it emerges undisguised one day – a core that grasps it correctly and uses it not as a curse but as a blessing for humanity. The earlier races were formed from an already existing one, by selecting suitable individuals or families and continuing them through the Manu in suitable uninhabited landscapes. This procedure is no longer feasible with today's global transportation, but it is also no longer necessary. In its place, education is provided by the cosmopolitan International Theosophical Society, which is to form this core.” (Berlin, 18.10.1903).

If the fifth secret of life was characterized more generally at that time, it was later described in more concrete terms as the unlawful use of the sacred powers of transformation:

"It truly allows us to gain deep insights into the mystery of existence when we know the source of injustice, evil, crime and the misfortunes that befall the world. As a result, the best and most sacred forces that exist, namely the powers of transformation, are applied in the wrong way. There would be no evil in the world if it were not for the most sacred powers of transformation.

More and more urgently and in ever greater detail, Rudolf Steiner spoke of the reign of evil, especially of its reign in history as the aberrations from the progressive evolutionary current, particularly since the outbreak of the First World War. The great significance of the realization that evil is the fundamental mystery of our time also makes it possible to understand why the visible emblem of the Anthroposophical Movement, the Goetheanum, was associated with it. At the laying of the foundation stone (Dornach, September 20, 1913), the Fifth Gospel, the Gospel of Knowledge, was mentioned for the first time, in accordance with an “occult obligation”. The core of this gospel, the macrocosmic Lord's Prayer, reads:

Evil reigns
Witnesses of dissolving egoity
From other selfhood guilt incurred
Experience in daily bread
In which heaven's will does not prevail
Because man separated himself from your kingdom
And forgot your name
You fathers in the heavens.

And in the following ten years of intensive construction work, with the help of many volunteers, the central motif, the sculptural group “The Representative of Humanity between Lucifer and' Ahriman”, was created as an artistic expression of the dual nature of the fifth secret of life. The Representative of Humanity – Christ, as seen by Rudolf Steiner in his recognition as the Master of all Masters – represents the full correspondence between microcosm and macrocosm and overcomes the powers of aberration, of evil: Lucifer and Ahriman, through his radiance of love. When the building, almost completed, was destroyed by fire on New Year's Eve 1922/23, the only thing that remained was this wooden sculpture – a legacy and a memorial from its creator for the realization of the deepest secret of life in our fifth period.

---