Introduction to the Descriptions of the Anthroposophical Path of Training in Rudolf Steiner's Complete Works

The content of this publication consists of texts that originated in personal teacher-student relationships. Since this is a very special part of the spiritual training taught by Rudolf Steiner, the following is intended to show, albeit only in outline, how this part fits into the whole of his work.

Rudolf Steiner's life's work and his life itself are inseparable. Everything he taught was achieved by him personally, just as his main philosophical work, “The Philosophy of Freedom,” was, in his own words, “a personal experience in every line.”¹ What he philosophically developed in it about the nature of pure thinking as his personal starting point, he formulated 20 years later in a simple but highly compelling way as the necessary starting point for those “who want to undergo an occult development with their own soul”: “It was considered a great saying of a great enlightener who said in the 18th century: Man, dare to use your reason! Today, a greater saying must resound in our souls, namely: Man, dare to address your concepts and ideas as the beginnings of your clairvoyance!” No one could attain true clairvoyance unless they already had “a tiny bit” of clairvoyance in their concepts and ideas, which can then be developed further and further “into the infinite.” That is why it is so important to understand that the beginning of clairvoyance is actually something “quite ordinary”: “One must only grasp the supersensible nature of concepts and ideas,” realize that they do not come into the soul from the sensory world, but from spiritual worlds. (Helsingfors, May 29, 1913, GA 146).

From this understanding of the supernatural nature of concepts and ideas, he developed his science and ethics of freedom and, with the resulting “emancipation of higher human consciousness from the shackles of all authority,” was able to realize ethical individualism in the field of occult research as well. He considered it his special task to remain strictly on the ground of individual research.² From the beginning of his spiritual-scientific work, he emphasized that whatever he contributed in this field would follow the line “opened up by the Philosophy of Freedom (Dornach, October 27, 1918, GA 185). GA 185). This remark ties in with his statement made at the same time about pure thinking as the central idea of The Philosophy of Freedom: “I see in this pure thinking the first, still shadowy revelation of the stages of spiritual knowledge.”³

Before Rudolf Steiner's work, serious paths to the supersensible worlds were bound by secrecy and strict personal leadership. He was the first to pave the way for modern, authority-free spiritual knowledge. In order to open this path to humanity as a whole, the communications of the results of his spiritual research were always accompanied by descriptions of the methods by which they had been obtained, as he once pointed out: "What is now called anthroposophy can be distinguished in two directions. One is the way of thinking, the way of searching, of researching. The other is the content, the results of this spiritual research, insofar as they have been able to develop to date." (Dornach, June 5, 1920).⁴

The development of these two directions took place step by step, in accordance with the laws of life.

I. On the epistemological foundation

I have presented this as a fundamental philosophical experience: that one can experience the conceptual in its reality, and that with such an experience one stands in the world in such a way that the human ego and the spiritual content of the world flow together. I have tried to show how this experience is just as real as a sensory experience. And from this primal experience of spiritual knowledge, the spiritual content of anthroposophy has grown.⁵

In his autobiography The Course of My Life, Rudolf Steiner recounts how he experienced the world as a dual reality even in his childhood: “I had two mental images that were vague, but played a major role in my soul life even before I was eight years old. I distinguished between things and beings ‘that can be seen’ and those ‘that cannot be seen.’” And although the reality of the spiritual world was as certain to him as that of the sensory world, he still needed “a kind of justification” for this experience: “I wanted to be able to tell myself that the experience of the spiritual world was just as little an illusion as that of the sensory world.” Then a formative experience came to the aid of the eight-year-old. He discovered a geometry book in the room of his village schoolteacher. With enthusiasm, he immersed himself in mathematical mental images. “Being able to grasp something purely in the mind” gave him an inner happiness; he felt that, just as geometry is experienced by the soul “only through its own powers,” so too must knowledge of the spiritual world be carried within oneself. Looking back, he saw in his relationship with geometry the “first emergence of a view” that gradually developed and took on a “definite, fully conscious form” around the age of 20.⁶

Since his experience with geometry, he strove to develop his thinking more and more. Every thought should be completely clear, so that it would not be pushed in any uncontrolled direction by vague feelings. He also wanted to arrive at a judgment about “how human thinking relates to the creation of nature.”⁷

In the field of natural science, there were the revolutionary findings of Darwin and Haeckel's theory of evolution regarding the natural development of living beings and humans, which had overturned the traditional view of supernatural creation. Rudolf Steiner experienced firsthand how, at that time, many people questioned all their ideals and religious convictions because they had to admit that if the scientific worldview alone was correct, then we as human beings were the product of natural necessity; all ideals and religious convictions were illusions; freedom is impossible.⁸ In the field of philosophy, the prevailing view was that human knowledge was limited. Human consciousness could not transcend itself; it had to remain within itself; it could know nothing of the true reality that lay beyond the world it shaped within itself.

Rudolf Steiner could neither fully endorse the developmental theory of his time, because it did not take into account the independent existence and activity of the spiritual, nor could he accept the postulate of the limits of knowledge. For him, it was a matter of lived experience that what is accessible to the senses, when “correctly recognized,” shows everywhere that it is a revelation of the spiritual, and that human beings, when they deepen their thinking sufficiently, “live within the reality of the world as a spiritual reality.”⁹

And so he became increasingly convinced that a new worldview was needed in order to do justice to the two halves of reality—nature and spirit. Its scientific value, he was convinced from the outset, would depend on the extent to which it could be justified epistemologically. For only when epistemology, as a science of science or fundamental science, can clarify what all individual sciences presuppose—the nature of cognition itself—can the relationship between the content of the individual sciences and the world be clarified, thus arriving at a true worldview. This required, in contrast to previous epistemological theories, whose approaches he had recognized as not truly unconditional, to prove through an “analysis of the act of cognition reduced to its ultimate elements” that “everything that must be brought to bear to explain and understand the world is accessible to our thinking.”.¹⁰ This basic idea can already be found in his very first written attempt in the summer of 1879, when, in the period between completing secondary school and beginning his studies at the Vienna Technical University, he had set out to rewrite Fichte's Science of Knowledge in his own terms. rewrite Fichte's The Science of Knowledge in his own terms.¹¹

When he was commissioned in the early 1880s to edit and annotate Goethe's scientific writings for Kürschner's Deutscher Nationalliteratur and followed Goethe's intellectual life in all the fields in which he was active, it became increasingly clear to him that his own view placed him within a theory of knowledge of Goethe's worldview. This led to his first epistemological work, Outlines of a Theory of Knowledge of Goethe's Worldview, 1886), which was published as an addition to Goethe's scientific writings. Almost 40 years later (1923), when he republished it, he wrote in the preface to the new edition that it still appeared to him as the epistemological “foundation and justification of everything he had later said and published,” because it spoke of an essence of cognition that opened the way from the world of the senses to a spiritual world.

In his various later reflections on his early fundamental research, he always emphasized that his fundamental question at that time was: To what extent can it be proven that real spirit is effective in human thinking? And that in order to answer this question, he had set himself the task of investigating the nature of human thinking itself. To this end, he first set aside everything that presented itself to him in visions of a spiritual world. For "no matter how convincing, no matter how intense subjective visions may appear to the soul, one has no right to give them any objective validity on the basis of their subjective appearance if one is not in a position to build a bridge from the certainties of natural science to the spiritual world.". He tried every possible way to find the answer to the question: “What is the essence of human thinking?” until he realized that only those who see in its highest expressions something that takes place “independently of the physical organization” can truly understand human thinking; so that even “in the most ordinary everyday life” there is a “super-sensible” element, if man only rises to real, pure thinking, where he is determined by nothing else than by the motives of thinking itself, not by what is naturally necessary in instincts, impulses of the will, etc. arises from physical processes.¹²

This gave him the certainty that this was where he had to start in order to build a bridge between natural science and spiritual knowledge: “I already attempted to build this bridge in my introductions to Goethe's scientific writings [1883-1897]. I then focused particularly on this in the elaboration of my short work Truth and Science [1892] and my larger book The Philosophy of Freedom [1894]. [...] And I believe that this Philosophy of Freedom has revealed to me nothing less than the supersensible nature of human thinking.”¹³

This provided him with proof that penetrating the reality of the spiritual world could be justified epistemologically in the same way as penetrating sensory reality. And he saw this as justification for the claim to exact scientific rigor for the stages of higher knowledge—imagination, inspiration, and intuition—now developed according to the “pattern of pure thinking”: “When I describe in my spiritual scientific writings those processes of cognition which, through spiritual experience and observation, lead to mental images of the spiritual world in the same way as the senses and the mind bound to them lead to mental images of the world of the senses and human life as it unfolds within it, then, in my opinion, this could only be presented as scientifically valid if there was proof that the process of pure thinking itself proved to be the first stage of those processes through which supersensible knowledge is attained. I believe I have provided this proof in my earlier writings.”¹⁴

After ten years of developing anthroposophy, then still called theosophy, he was asked to give a lecture on theosophy at the Fourth International Philosophers' Congress in Bologna (April 1911). He did so with the topic “The Psychological Foundations and Epistemological Position of Theosophy.”¹⁵ He concluded these fundamental remarks with the words: "The soul state of the spiritual researcher can only be understood in that the illusion of ordinary consciousness has been overcome and a starting point for the soul life has been gained which experiences the core of the human being in real freedom from the physical organization. Everything else that is then achieved through exercises is only a deeper digging into the transcendent, in which the I of ordinary consciousness is real, although it does not know itself as such in the same. - Spiritual research is thus proven to be conceivable as epistemological. This conceivability will naturally only be admitted by those who can take the view that so-called critical epistemology is only able to maintain its proposition of the impossibility of transcending consciousness if it fails to see through the illusion of the human core being enclosed in the physical organization and of impressions being received through the senses. I am aware that my epistemological remarks are only sketchy hints. But perhaps it will be possible to recognize from these hints that they are not isolated ideas, but that they spring from a well-developed epistemological basic view.

II. On the public (exoteric) presentations of spiritual training

I want to build on the power that enables me to bring spiritual students onto the path of development. That alone must be my inaugural act.¹⁶

Towards the end of the 19th century, Rudolf Steiner became increasingly certain that if supersensible knowledge, which is indispensable for the further development of humanity, is to become common knowledge in a form truly appropriate to modern consciousness, then it must also be sought through means other than purely scientific and philosophical ones. And so he was faced with the question: “How can a way be found to express what is seen inwardly as true in forms that can be understood by the age?”

From his struggle with this question arose the decision to now also present concrete descriptions of the spiritual world to the public.

In order to appreciate the full gravity of this decision, it must be borne in mind that, up to that time, supersensible knowledge was only known in the symbolic form handed down from ancient times and cultivated in strictly closed circles. Although the publications of H. P. Blavatsky had just broken the first ground in this tradition of secrecy, but the general public was more interested in the sensational phenomena of somnambulism, mediumship, and spiritualism. Rudolf Steiner had to reject all this because of his position on the higher powers of human knowledge, since, according to his spiritual insight, “supposed knowledge” that does not recognize a kind of model in pure thinking and that does not move in the spiritual realm with the same prudence and inner clarity as clear thinking “cannot lead to a real spiritual world.¹⁷ At that time, when everything supersensible was still rejected as completely suspect by the authoritative circles of science, it took great courage for a renowned writer in the fields of natural science and philosophy to come forward with concrete supersensible truths for which scientific validity was claimed.

When he then set about putting his decision into practice in the last year of the 19th century, he drew on a cultural document that he had long regarded as one of the “deepest writings in world literature”: Goethe's riddle fairy tale of the green snake and the beautiful lily (Munich, May 22, 1907, GA 99), because this prose poem by Goethe was for him an expression of the fact that Goethe had stood throughout his entire life on the standpoint of the developability of human knowledge, which meant nothing other than the principle of initiation: “Initiation means nothing other than raising human abilities to ever higher levels of knowledge and thereby gaining deeper insights into the nature of the world.” (Berlin, October 24, 1908, GA 57).

In the essay Goethe's Secret Revelation. On Goethe's 150th Birthday: August 28, 1899, he began by translating the content of fairy tale images into modern terms. He made it clear that the big question is how human beings in the new age, if they want to ascend from the earthly to the spiritual, must develop their soul forces, and that the solution to this riddle is hinted at in fairy tales. For if, up to now, there have been only two involuntary states of soul necessary to enter the supersensible realm—one through creative imagination, which is a reflection of supersensible experience, and the other when conscious knowledge darkens and withers away, so that it lives out its life as superstition, vision, mediumship—it is now time for a new state, one that can be brought about deliberately. However, this presupposes that the serpent, which represents knowledge of the sensory world, comes to the realization that the highest can only be attained through selfless devotion. As soon as it is ready to give up its own existence, its body forms a bridge, now accessible to all, over the great river that separates the two realms of sensuality and spirituality. A new edition was published in 1918, see GA 22 Goethe's Spirit in Its Revelation Through His Faust and Through the Fairy Tale of the Snake and the Lily. A new edition was published in 1918, see GA 22 “Goethe's Spirit in Its Revelation Through His Faust and Through the Fairy Tale of the Snake and the Lily.”¹⁸

At the time, it was hardly noticed that this translation of Goethe's images into modern thought had been a step of cultural-historical significance. But as time went on, it became increasingly clear. Just one year later, in the fall of 1900, Rudolf Steiner was invited to give lectures to a circle of people who, although not scientists, were deeply interested in real spiritual knowledge. This was the Berlin group of the Theosophical Society, founded in America in 1875 by H. P. Blavatsky and others, which soon moved its headquarters to India. Before the Berlin theosophists, who were open to concrete spiritual knowledge, it was now possible to speak “entirely esoterically” about what could only be hinted at in the essay on Goethe's fairy tale: “It was an important experience for me to be able to speak in words that were shaped by the spiritual world, after I had previously been forced by circumstances [...] to allow the spiritual to shine through only in my representations.”¹⁹

This fairy tale lecture became the “primordial cell” of the anthroposophical movement, because the first decisive words in the fairy tale, “It is time!”—spoken in a powerful voice by the “old man with the lamp,” the figure who directs and guides all events—were now followed by the second words: “One individual cannot help, but those who unite with many at the right hour can.” Teacher and student are mutually dependent. In this sense, after being asked in the spring of 1902 to take over the office of General Secretary of the German Section, which was then being founded, Rudolf Steiner wrote to a representative of the German Theosophists immediately before officially taking up his post, stating what he saw as his task: “I want to build on the strength that enables me to bring spiritual students onto the path of development. That alone must be my inaugural act.”²⁰ Since then, work has continued with ever-increasing intensity on the development of spiritual science in connection with the establishment of a social association that would provide the necessary nurturing ground for the general public.

While the essay on Goethe's fairy tales (1899) had only been able to hint at the new principle of initiation, this was clearly documented in the writings that emerged from the first two series of lectures given to the Berlin Theosophists, “Mysticism at the Dawn of Modern Spiritual Life and Its Relationship to the Modern Worldview” (1901, GA 7) and “Christianity as Mystical Fact” (1902, GA 8). Based on his conviction that the modern achievements of natural science demand an elevation to true mysticism, the preface to "Mysticism ...that one can very well be a “faithful adherent of the scientific worldview” and yet seek “the paths to the soul” that true mysticism leads, and that one can only gain a full understanding of the facts in nature if one recognizes the spirit in the sense of true mysticism. - The preface to the book “Christianity as Mystical Fact,” in which Christianity is deciphered from the essence of the mysteries, i.e., from initiation, also states: “I do not wish to have written a single line that I cannot justify before a truly self-understanding knowledge of nature, but also not a single line that coincides with the crude materialistic view of many scientific thinkers of our day.”

In the further course of his work, the insight into the essence of Christianity, the “mystical fact,” was deepened and emphasized in connection with the path of training: Since the death of Christ on Golgotha, through which the Christ force, previously found only in spiritual heights, became connected with the development of the earth, there lives in all human souls the force through which each soul can now independently find its way into the spiritual world, whereas before this event this was only possible through the authoritative instructions of the teachers in the mystery schools.

It is thus thanks to the event at the turn of the age that we can attain higher knowledge through spiritual self-education. The prerequisite for this, however, is that human beings train themselves to become instruments for this purpose. Just as no one can tell from the appearance of water that it contains hydrogen and oxygen, which have completely different properties from water before they are broken down by a chemist, so no one can recognize the true reality of the spiritual-soul realm until human beings have detached their spiritual-soul realm from the outer physical realm through spiritual-scientific methods, albeit now in an inner soul process that must be prepared in the deepest depths of the soul. (Norrköping, July 13, 1914, GA 155). However, before the necessary instructions could be taught publicly, it was necessary to develop the consciousness soul forces, which have been becoming increasingly apparent since the 15th/16th century. Only then could a spiritually perceptive natural scientist methodically develop the path to knowledge and teach it publicly. For a spiritual researcher in this sense, the time of the ancient prophets is over. As a “simple researcher,” he wants only to draw attention to what is necessary in order to be able to research the depths of the human soul: “The spiritual researcher says: I have found it; if you search, you will find it yourself!” The time would come when spiritual researchers would be recognized as “simple researchers,” just as chemists and biologists are recognized as researchers in their fields, except that spiritual researchers conduct their research in a field that is close to every human soul. (Norrköping, July 13, 1914, GA 155).

The future will increasingly have to prove that the significance of Rudolf Steiner's work lies primarily in the method he pioneered for everyone. For such a method, which enables everyone to convince themselves of the reality of the spiritual world in an independent and verifiable way, did not exist before.

With the first introductory work on the supersensible world and human destiny, Theosophy (1904), the final chapter, “The Path of Knowledge,” also began to describe publicly the initial conditions of the spiritual scientific method of knowledge. In this first presentation, it was strongly emphasized that the development of higher cognitive abilities can only proceed from thinking, because thinking is the highest ability that humans have in the sensory world. Immediately thereafter, a series of essays began to appear with detailed, concrete descriptions of “How to Know Higher Worlds,” the first sentence of which reads: “In every human being there lie dormant abilities through which he can acquire knowledge of the higher worlds.” In further publications, especially in the fundamental work “Outline of the Secret Science” (1910) and in many lectures, not only were new research results published, but the path of spiritual training was also explained from ever new perspectives.

The importance that Rudolf Steiner himself attached to these publicly available descriptions of the path of training is evident, for example, in the following statement: "In our time, the principle of initiation has already undergone a tremendous change in that, to a certain extent, to a certain stage, initiation can be attained, as it were, without any personal guidance whatsoever, simply by being able to explain the principles of initiation to the public in the present day as clearly as has been done, for example, in my book “How to Know Higher Worlds.” Anyone who seriously attempts to go through the experiences described in this book can come very far in relation to the principle of initiation." (Berlin, February 3, 1913, GA 144).

However, it would be a misunderstanding to conclude from this that every person interested in spiritual science must also begin spiritual training. He once expressed this in a personal letter: "Theosophy is necessary for our age. [...] But it would be bad if every theosophist also wanted to become an occult student. That would be just as if, because all people need clothes, everyone had to become a tailor.“²¹ This was also stated in public publications: “I would like to expressly point out that by no means does every person who wants to make spiritual science or anthroposophy fruitful for their soul in an appropriate way need to become a spiritual researcher.”²²

After spiritual science had gained a certain degree of popularity through years of tireless lecturing throughout Europe, it was now possible to proceed to a more precise presentation of the research method in the thought forms of the science of knowledge. In the work “An Outline of the Secret Science,” published at the beginning of 1910, with its two main chapters, “The Evolution of the World and Man” and "The Knowledge of Higher Worlds,“ it is pointed out that the study of spiritual scientific communications is a sure path that leads to non-sensory thinking, but that there is another path, ”which is safer and, above all, more precise, but for many people more difficult," namely the path presented in the epistemological writings, especially in The Philosophy of Freedom. Although these writings do not contain any communications from spiritual science itself, they nevertheless show that pure thinking, working only within itself, can gain insights into the world, life, and human beings: "These writings stand on a very important intermediate stage between the recognition of the sensory world and that of the spiritual world. They offer what thinking can gain when it rises above sensory observation but still avoids entering into spiritual research. Anyone who allows these writings to work on their whole soul already stands in the spiritual world, only that it presents itself to them as a world of thoughts. Anyone who feels able to allow such an intermediate stage to work on them is on a sure path; and can thereby gain a feeling for the higher world that will bear the most beautiful fruits for all time to come.“²⁴

This reference to epistemological writings as an intermediate stage between the recognition of the sensory world and that of the spiritual world serves as a transition to the epistemological description of the three-stage method of knowledge—imaginative, inspirative, and intuitive—which begins at this point. In April 1911, a lecture on “The Psychological Foundations and Epistemological Position of Theosophy” was given at the aforementioned Philosophers' Congress in Bologna.²⁵ In the following writings, “The Riddles of Philosophy” with the concluding chapter “Outlook for Anthroposophy,” the author “Philosophy and Anthroposophy,” GA 35. In the following writings, “The Riddles of Philosophy” with the concluding chapter “Outlook on Anthroposophy” (1914), “The Riddle of Man” (1916), and “On the Riddles of the Soul” (1917), the epistemological and philosophical foundations of anthroposophical spiritual research were further developed. These include several fundamental essays published between 1916 and 1918 (all in GA 35), as well as the author's abstracts of a series of ten lectures held at the Goetheanum, published in 1922 in the weekly magazine Das Goetheanum, which are particularly concise in their formulation of the method of knowledge and the knowledge of the world and human beings gained through it. GA 25.²⁶ Four further essays followed in 1923, entitled On the Life of the Soul.²⁷ Looking at this, he repeatedly emphasized that a completely organic progression must be conceived from the epistemological basic views of the writings Truth and Science and The Philosophy of Freedom to the content of spiritual science or “anthroposophy.”

But not only through publications, but also through public events—congresses, university courses, etc.—it was explained how the various sciences can be enriched by spiritual scientific insights and what the nature of the method is by which they are gained. At the first university course at the Goetheanum (in the lecture Dornach, October 3, 1920, in “Grenzen der Naturerkenntnis” [Limits of Natural Knowledge], GA 322), reference was made again, as in 1910 in “Geheimwissenschaft im Umriß” [Outline of Esoteric Science], to the two different forms of presenting the path of knowledge: “In my book How to Know Higher Worlds, a sure path into the supersensible realms is indeed characterized, but it is characterized in such a way that it is suitable for everyone, above all for those who have not gone through an actual scientific life.” However, anyone who wants to follow the path of knowledge as a scientist must first pursue what is presented in his Philosophy of Freedom as pure thinking, in order to reach the other pole of knowledge, perception, and from there the path to imagination, which he considers to be the right one for the Western world. The exercises given for this purpose are, however, essentially the same as those in How to Know Higher Worlds or those in the present volume. They are all based on meditative immersion in symbolic, allegorical mental images, as described in the lecture given at the Philosophers' Congress in Bologna in 1911. (See p. 469 of the present volume.)

What had been clear to Rudolf Steiner from the beginning of his work, namely that genuine spiritual knowledge must be incorporated into the official sciences for the sake of the entire progress of culture, had prompted him and his colleagues in the difficult years after the First World War to awaken interest and understanding for spiritual science and its methods among scientifically trained people through such free university courses. In words that can be moving because they are still largely true today, he expressed his efforts in this direction in one of these free university courses, saying that when he looked back on the way he had been trying for more than twenty years to explain to the world how spiritual researchers arrive at their results, he could say: "If I have not yet succeeded in finding resonance in the world for this anthroposophically oriented spiritual science, if it has again and again become necessary to speak for those who are less able to go into details because they are not scientifically trained, and if it has been little possible to speak for those who are scientifically trained, then experience has shown that this is essentially due to those who are scientifically trained. So far, they have only been willing to listen to what the spiritual researcher has to say about his methods to a very limited extent. Let us hope that this will change in the future. For it is absolutely necessary that we achieve an ascent through deeper forces than those who clearly show that they are incapable of doing so, because they have basically led us into a decline of our culture." (Stuttgart, March 18, 1921, GA 324).

III. On the internal (esoteric) representations

I have no other aspiration than this: to communicate what I am able to research in supersensible worlds in the form of knowledge, with the right sense of responsibility toward contemporary science and humanity. I present what I can say is either appropriate for contemporary humanity in its current state of spiritual maturity, or else something else for which individual groups of people must first attain maturity through (esoteric) preparatory training. (October 1924)²⁸

When Rudolf Steiner, an exotericist par excellence, also worked as an esoteric teacher, it was by no means to withhold any spiritual truths from the public. For him, the esoteric, as he represented it, was merely a special form of expression for that which, as the actual occult life, cannot ultimately be expressed in words at all, but must be experienced. Nevertheless, when speaking of pointing out and facilitating the paths to this ability to experience, the way in which this can be done depends largely on the possibility of formulation: “One says it once exoterically, once esoterically, and when one speaks exoterically and esoterically, these are, as it were, two different dialects of an inexpressible language.” (Dornach, October 18, 1915, GA 254). This means: “There is no absolute boundary between exoteric and esoteric, but one flows into the other” (Stuttgart, June 12, 1921, GA 342), because: "The moment we have found a form of expression for the inner essence of a thing, we have made the esoteric exoteric. The esoteric can therefore never be communicated other than in exoteric form.“²⁹

The objective difficulty of translating spiritual insights into the language of modern thought has been pointed out many times over the years. For example, as follows:

“When we approach language with the great mysteries that reveal themselves to us in our souls and want to pour into words what is revealed to us inwardly, then a struggle arises against this weak instrument of language, which is truly inadequate in a certain respect.” (Bern, September 2, 1910, GA 123).

Why this transformation involves such a “hard inner struggle” is explained in the short essay “Language and the Spirit of Language” (1922)³⁰ with the explanation that the soul, which advances from mere conceptual thinking to vision that reveals essence, discovers the spirit of language in its living power:

"Those who see in this way distance themselves in their seeing from what can be expressed through language. Their seeing does not initially find its way to the lips. If they resort to words, they immediately have the feeling that the content of their vision becomes something else. If they nevertheless want to communicate their visions, their struggle with language begins. They seek to use everything possible within the realm of language to form an image of what he sees. He searches everywhere in the realm of language for sounds and turns of phrase. He fights a hard inner battle. He has to tell himself: language has something idiosyncratic about it. It already expresses everything possible in itself; you too must surrender to its idiosyncrasies so that it can take in what you see. If you want to pour what you have seen spiritually into language, one does not encounter an indefinite, waxy element that can be shaped at will, but rather a living spirit, the spirit of language. If one struggles honestly in this way, the struggle can have the best and most beautiful outcome. There comes a moment when one feels that the spirit of language is taking in what one sees. The words and phrases that come to mind take on a spiritual quality; they cease to “mean” what they usually mean and slip into what has been seen. Something like a living communication with the spirit of language occurs. Language takes on a personal character; one deals with it as with another human being."

Considering the wealth of research results communicated over the course of more than two decades, these statements give an idea of the intellectual effort that had to be made in order to translate the investigated supernatural facts into modern language. However, this was absolutely necessary in order to be able to communicate them publicly, since only in this form can they be freely accepted, doubted, or even rejected by the ordinary consciousness. The conditions are different, however, for presentations of spiritual facts that either cannot be revealed in idea form at all or cannot be revealed in idea form at certain times.³¹ This required a circle of people who wanted to move from the exoteric to the esoteric. That is, it required people who were willing to take on the obligation to treat the truths communicated to them as responsibly as their nature requires. This is referred to when it is said that for certain communications, “individual groups of people should acquire the maturity” for them in an (esoteric) preparatory training.³²

The history of such groups taught esoterically by Rudolf Steiner shows that he had to accept many disappointments in this regard and that, as a result, the tendency toward exotericism became increasingly strong over time.

The first group of people to receive such esoteric preliminary training was the Esoteric School.³³ Its establishment coincided with the public presentation of the path of training in the book Theosophy and in the essays “How to Know Higher Worlds” and “The Stages of Higher Knowledge” in 1904/05. The Esoteric School was intended to address in concrete terms the task of “bringing spiritual students onto the path of development.” But such a school was also necessary because it was completely clear in the cultural situation at the beginning of the century that without a foundation of people who wanted to make spiritual development the guiding principle of their lives, spiritual science would only be preached to “half-deaf ears.”³⁴

The initially very small number of esoteric students made it possible for them to receive personal advice in their efforts, in accordance with Rudolf Steiner's principle that there is no development in itself, but only individual development processes: “There is only the development of one or the other or the third, the fourth or the thousandth human being.” (Berlin, October 31, 1910, GA 125). However, training instructions in public writings, since they are intended for all people, must be of a general nature. He solved the problem of how individual development processes can be presented in an exemplary form by artistic means in his four Mystery Dramas, written between 1910 and 1913. After the first one – “The Portal of Initiation: A Rosicrucian Mystery,” which was based on images from Goethe's fairy tale – had been premiered, he commented on this twofold way of presenting the path of training: “If the book ‘How to Know Higher Worlds’ contains, as it were, the beginning of the secret of every human being's development, then the Rosicrucian Mystery contains the secret of the development of a single human being, Johannes Thomasius.” While the descriptions in the books “How to Know Higher Worlds” and “The Secret Science in Outline,” because they are intended to be applicable to every human individuality, must have “an abstract, semi-theoretical character despite all their concreteness,” the presentation in the drama can be “basically much more intense, more true to life, and more real because it is much more individual.” He was even convinced that he would no longer need to speak about many things that exist “in the realm of the esoteric, the occult” if everything contained in the Rosicrucian Mystery were to have an effect “on the souls of dear friends and many other people.” (Berlin, October 31, 1910, GA 125).

When, after the outbreak of the First World War in the summer of 1914, it became necessary to close the Esoteric School because closed meetings had become questionable under the conditions of war, he was nevertheless asked to continue giving personal esoteric consultations. He complied with these requests in many private conversations, although he already believed at that time that such private consultations were no longer necessary because sufficient training material was now available in print. He had already emphasized this in the preface to the fifth edition of How to Know Higher Worlds, dated September 7, 1914: "At that time [1904/05, when the essays that make up the book were written], I had to say that much of what was not yet described in the book could be learned through “oral communication.” Much of what was meant by such references has now been published. However, it was these references that perhaps did not completely rule out erroneous opinions among readers. For example, one might see something much more essential in the personal relationship with this or that teacher than should be seen in the case of someone striving for spiritual training. I hope that in this new edition I have succeeded, through the way in which I have presented certain details, in emphasizing more clearly how, for someone seeking spiritual training in accordance with the present spiritual conditions, it is much more important to have a completely direct relationship with the objective spiritual world than to have a relationship with the personality of a teacher. in the sense of the present spiritual conditions, it is much more important to have a completely direct relationship with the objective spiritual world than a relationship with the personality of a teacher. In spiritual training, the teacher will increasingly assume the position of a helper, which, according to the newer views, is the position of the teacher in any other branch of knowledge.

He had to emphatically assert this within the Anthroposophical Society in early summer 1917, when former members accused him in a public journal of giving exercises that were harmful.³⁵ At that time, he categorically refused to continue giving esoteric advice in private conversations. In future, everything must take place in the full light of public scrutiny. Sufficient training material was available; people should simply read How to Know Higher Realms. He would very soon prove that private conversations of this kind were no longer necessary for the functioning of esoteric life: "In a short time you will have a complete substitute."³⁶ However, this did not happen until seven years later, when the esoteric school was completely reorganized as the “Free School for Spiritual Science at the Goetheanum.”

The intention expressed at that time within the Anthroposophical Society to adapt the esoteric teaching method to the spirit of the times, which was striving for complete openness, obviously led to the fact that soon afterwards, in a public lecture (Basel, October 19, 1917, GA 72) that anthroposophy wanted to live entirely in accordance with the spirit of the times, which strives for complete openness. And it was added: If today (1917) some things still have the “appearance of old institutions,”³⁷ it is only insofar as certain preparations are necessary if one wants to understand what will come later. In keeping with this, the eighth edition of “How to Know Higher Realms,” published shortly thereafter (May 1918), emphasized once again, as in the preface to the 1914 edition: “When it is said that the student of occultism needs personal instruction, this should be understood to mean that the book itself is such personal instruction.” And two months later, in July 1918, the essay “Former Secrecy and Present Publication...”³⁸ concludes with the words: ”We live in an age in which supersensible knowledge can no longer remain the secret possession of a few, but must become the common property of all those in whom the meaning of life in this age stirs as a need of their soul's existence. This need is already present in the unconscious depths of the human soul, and is much more widespread than many people suspect."

When, in the course of 1923/24, Rudolf Steiner set about reorganizing the entire anthroposophical movement in accordance with its necessary public character, and when he released to the public the manuscript prints of his lectures given within the Society, which had previously been available only to members, the esoteric school was also to be reorganized in this spirit. As the “Free School for Spiritual Science at the Goetheanum,” it was to become the first public esoteric school, because “secret societies are not possible today; the present age demands something else,” and it would be ensured “that people will always know to the widest extent what it does.” (Dornach, January 30, 1924, GA 260a). The only and self-evident reservation was that, as is also the case in public education, no one would be admitted to a higher level until they had mastered the lower ones. In this sense, spiritual science should be cultivated in the Anthroposophical Society in the form of ideas, because in the modern sense, human beings should first get to know the spiritual world in the form of ideas. In the three classes of the “School of Spiritual Science,” participants should be gradually guided up to the realms of the spiritual world that cannot be revealed “through the form of ideas”: “They need to find means of expression for their imaginations, inspirations, and intuitions.”³⁹

However, due to Rudolf Steiner's death just one and a half years later, only the first of the three planned esoteric classes could be established, and even then only “the first section,” as he remarked in the last, 19th hour of the Dornach class lessons. There, the esoteric teachings were no longer structured as in the earlier esoteric school, with personal exercises and lectures for all, but in the form of a course in meditation sayings and their explanations, which was the same for everyone. (GA 270/ I-IV)Rudolf Steiner's comments on these two methods of teaching can be found on page 514 of this volume.

IV. On esoteric exercises

The goal of contemplation (meditation) on symbolic mental images and sensations is, strictly speaking, the development of higher organs of perception within the human astral body. These are initially created from the substance of this astral body. (“An Outline of Esoteric Science”)

In order to perceive in higher worlds, one needs, just as in the physical world, healthily developed organs of perception. Their proper and careful training has therefore always been the fundamental concern of every true occult training. All the exercises given by Rudolf Steiner are also intended to achieve this goal. This is described many times in his complete works, most fundamentally in the book How to Know Higher Worlds. There he also explains what the exercises achieve, for "it is one of the principles of true secret science that those who devote themselves to it should do so with full consciousness. He should not undertake or practice anything whose effect he does not know. A secret teacher who gives someone advice or instruction will always say at the same time what will happen in the body, soul, or spirit of the person striving for higher knowledge if they follow it."

The extent to which the exercises can bring about the first requirement of the spiritual scientific training method, namely the training of the organs of perception of the astral body, is explained several times: During their daily lives, human beings are completely devoted to the impressions of the outer world that affect their senses and their intellect. The same is true of the astral body, since it is completely immersed in the physical body when we are awake. Even when it leaves the physical body during sleep, it remains under the influence of these forces; it follows the elasticity of the physical body, not its own, and is thus prevented from developing its own organs. If this is to change, something “very specific” must be done with the physical body during waking hours so that it can be imprinted on the astral body and have a corresponding effect at night. To this end, the inner life must be taken in hand in the manner prescribed by methodical training: “This is called meditation, concentration, or contemplation. These are exercises that are just as strictly prescribed in the corresponding schools as microscopy, etc., is in laboratories.” The nature of the exercises is based on the fact that the teachers of the methods apply “all the knowledge” about the effects of the exercises that has been tested over thousands of years of human life; they know that these exercises are so intense that when the astral body leaves the physical body during sleep, it can free itself from its after-effects and take on its own form, i.e., it can gradually develop the organs necessary for higher perception. However, if the exercises are done incorrectly, “unnatural forms” are built into the astral body that contradict the greater whole of the world. Therefore, those who teach such exercises take on a great responsibility. (Hamburg, May 30 and 31, 1908, GA 103; Nuremberg, June 18 and 19, 1908, GA 104; Munich, August 24, 1909, GA 113).

This is probably one of the main reasons why it is repeatedly emphasized that the spiritual scientific method is the most appropriate for modern Western man. For even though the exercises are basically the same in all schools of initiation in terms of their significance for human beings, in pre-Christian times they were directed more toward training the powers of thinking, while in post-Christian times they were directed more toward training the powers of the soul; Since the 14th century, due to changing circumstances, a “special kind of will training, of exercises of the will” has been introduced in the so-called Rosicrucian schools. (Nuremberg, June 19, 1908, GA 104).

These differences and the different relationships between teacher and student characterize the three main types of initiation methods that have developed in the course of the post-Atlantean era: the ancient Eastern yoga method, the Christian Gnostic method, and the Christian Rosicrucian method, i.e., their further development as spiritual scientific methods. Before these descriptions were presented, however, it was first clarified that there is not only the Oriental training method, which was the sole subject of discussion in the Theosophical Society at that time. This clarification was made public immediately. In the magazine “Luzifer-Gnosis” (May 1905), in a review of the German translation of Annie Besant's lectures “The Path of Discipleship,” which had just been published, it is stated, after a very positive assessment, that it should not remain unspoken that these statements are correct for the Indian people. Although truth is “one” and the highest summit of knowledge and life for all times and all peoples, it should not be believed that the path of discipleship could be the same in form for the people of present-day Europe as for the Indians: "The essence remains the same; the forms change in this realm. It is therefore only natural that in the articles of this magazine, “How to Gain Knowledge of Higher Worlds,” some things are said differently than in the lectures given by Annie Besant for the Indian people. The path described in this magazine is the one that, in adaptation to life in the West and to the stage of development of the European human being, has emerged as the correct one in the secret schools of Europe since the 14th century. And Europeans can only succeed if they follow this path laid out for them by their own secret teachers.“ This is not to say, however, that it is useless for Europeans to learn what is appropriate for India: ”The stage at which Europeans stand is precisely the one that makes it necessary for them to learn everything through the intellect. In order to progress, the intellect must compare and measure what is familiar against what is more distant. It must listen to what is said to the brothers of humanity in the Far East for their salvation. That is why books such as this one are to be welcomed with satisfaction, not because the same thing could be done in Europe." (GA 34). V. On the meditation verses: the heart of esoteric exercises Many years before making this statement, he had already spoken of the growing tendency to apply abstract language only to material things as one of the reasons that led to the inauguration of the spiritual world movement at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. For “if we had waited another 100 years, our words would no longer be able to express what spiritual science has to say.” And so it was truly “a matter of waiting for the most favorable conditions of the time” in order to still have the opportunity, through spiritual science, to “imprint new words” on everything, to give all words a “new character,” indeed “to renew language itself,” so that people might regain a sense that certain words do not merely refer to something tangible or visible to the eye, but to something that points to higher worlds. (Berlin, October 19, 1907, GA 284). And in the public lecture “Spiritual Science and Language” (Berlin, January 20, 1910, GA 59), this is presented as a lofty goal: “Spiritual science will be able to conquer the supersensible worlds through thought; it will become capable of pouring thought into sound images, so that our language can once again become a means of communicating what the soul beholds in the supersensible world.”

Shortly thereafter, in the same journal, within the essays “The Stages of Higher Knowledge” (GA 12), a description began of three possible methods of initiation: the ancient Oriental yoga method, the Christian Gnostic method, and the Rosicrucian method. In the continuation, it was to be “described in detail” how these three methods differ from each other and under what circumstances “one person or another, as a student of occultism, may come to follow, even in modern Europe, not the Rosicrucian path, but the Oriental or the older Christian path, although the Rosicrucian path is currently the most natural.” This path is not only as Christian as the older Christian path, but can also be followed by people who “believe themselves to be at the height of modern scientific worldview.” However, the detailed description announced there never appeared because the magazine had to be discontinued due to Rudolf Steiner's excessive workload. Nevertheless, from then on, descriptions of the stages of the three methods were repeatedly given in lectures for theosophists. (See, for example, the Stuttgart lecture cycle of August 1906, “Vor dem Tore der Theosophie” [Before the Gates of Theosophy], GA 95).

Many books would have to be written to exhaust the full meaning of these sayings, for not only is every word meaningful, but also the symmetry of the words, the way they are distributed, the intensifications they contain, and much else besides, so that only long and patient devotion to the subject can exhaust what lies within them.⁴⁰

Since the spiritual scientific method for training the astral organs of perception starts from the imagination, this requires that one devote oneself as much as possible to symbolic mental images. However, these need not only be images that one has before one's inner eye, but can also be words in which profound truths about the world are condensed. (Vienna, March 28, 1910, GA 119).

What Rudolf Steiner repeatedly formed into meditative sayings from the truths of the world constituted the very heart of his esoteric teaching. Today, it is difficult to fully appreciate what this has brought into the spiritual life of modern times. This requires a comprehensive appreciation of his entire linguistic achievement. He himself once pointed out that anthroposophy presented him not only with “formal tasks of knowledge” but also with “historically creative tasks,” which he understood to mean forming language into an instrument adequate for the representation of spiritual visions. (Dornach, September 29, 1921, GA 343).

Time and again, in a wide variety of contexts, it has been pointed out that only by penetrating the sound-forming, language-creating forces themselves can we regain an awareness of what was still instinctively understood in ancient times: that everything arose from the “word.” Until the mental image and the sound content of language fell apart, all ancient wisdom, all science, was actually only a paraphrase of that sentence which lies at the foundation of the whole mystery of the world: "In the beginning was the Word.“ (Dornach, April 9, 1921, GA 204). How essential it must be in the sense of spiritual science to rediscover this understanding is succinctly expressed in the sentence: ”Basically, all our spiritual science is a search for the lost word." (Berlin, April 25, 1916, GA 167). It is important to become aware of that high goal of development which in occultism is called the “mystery of the creative word,” that is, the knowledge that just as everything once arose from the divine word, so in the distant future of humanity the human word will become creative: “When the earth has been transformed into Jupiter, the word will be creative in the mineral kingdom; in the Venus state, the larynx will produce plants; and so it will continue until it is able to produce its own kind. [...] What we can only say today, we will be able to produce in future states of the earth's development in such a way that it will remain.” How this is possible is explained by the following comparison:

"I am speaking to you here. You hear my words, you hear my thoughts, which are initially in my soul and which I could also hide from you if I did not put them into words. I translate them into sounds; if there were no air between you and me, you would not be able to hear the words. When I utter a word here, the air in the room is moved at that moment; each time I utter a word, I set the entire air space into a certain state of vibration; the entire body of air vibrates in the manner in which my words are uttered. Let us now go a little further. Imagine you could make the air liquid and then solid. Even today, it is possible to make our air solid; you know that water can exist in a vaporous state, that it can cool down and then become liquid, and that it can become solid in the form of ice. Now imagine I speak the word “God” through the air. If, at the moment when the sound waves were here, you could make the air solid, then a form — such as a shell shape — would fall down. With the word ‘world’, another wave would fall down. You could catch my words, and each word would correspond to a crystallized form of air." (Kassel, June 28, 1907, GA 100).

In this sense, everything arose from the word, from the “choral interaction” of divine-spiritual beings with the aim of creating human beings, the human form: “The human being” – the emergence of the human form – “is the ideal of the gods and the goal of the gods.”⁴¹ The way in which the deepest secrets of development are connected with this form is pointed out in various places in the complete works. It is even said that the realization of this human form is nothing less than “the meaning of the entire evolution of the earth.” It is what lies spiritually at the foundation of the earth, but not “in this or that form, as the image of this or that race, but as the universal ideal of humanity.” (Leipzig, September 4, 1908, GA 106). However, it should be noted that there is a “tremendous difference” between this form as the form of the human being becoming an I and the physical body: “The physical body is what takes place physically and chemically in the human being. In the present human being, this takes place within the human form. But this form itself is thoroughly spiritual.”⁴²

Today, human beings are called upon to consciously participate in the realization of this divine ideal. If this form is to be perpetuated through the human word itself, then the creative becoming of the human word must already be prepared through work on language: “What human beings already express as preparation for the future human being is the word, language.” For what man speaks remains in the Akashic Records: “It is the first seed for the future human being.” (Berlin, October 2, 1905, GA 93a).

Seen from this perspective, meditation formulas can not only be an aid to personal spiritual development, but can also enable us to consciously participate in the preparation of this goal of human development. This is because they are “spiritually articulated” words and can generate “vibrations of the word” that correspond to the vibrations of thought in the Akashic matter. (Berlin, December 28, 1905, GA 264; Munich, October 28, 1906, GA 94).

This is based on the fact that what is important in real occult life is hidden in the formulas: the sound value of the words. For “at the moment when the thought is transformed into a word, even if the word as such is only thought, as in word meditation, the word is imprinted in the ether of the world,” but the thought is not, “otherwise we could never become free beings in pure thinking.” (Dornach, March 13, 1921, GA 203). Therefore, when the sound value of words becomes alive within us in meditation, every letter, every phrase can have an effect on the soul. The gate to the spiritual world can thus be opened. (Vienna, February 22, 1907, GA 97). In the same sense, many years later, it is said once again: If one could become aware that there is “something more than speech” in words, then the word can become something through which human beings can become aware of “the first connection, the first communication with the divine.” And it is added that because this is “in a sense a path from the subjectivity of thinking to objectivity,” it is possible for something that is “spiritually objective” to flow into the word. (Dornach, September 27, 1921, morning, GA 343). This points to the second stage of training, inspiration, because “through inspiration, the possibility arises of gaining consciousness of a spiritual-soul outer world, a spiritual-soul objectivity.” (Stuttgart, September 3, 1921, GA?3).

When Rudolf Steiner often referred to the meditation formulas he taught by the Indian term “mantras”⁴³ Or “mantric” sayings, they differ in essential points from what is understood by mantra in India. In Hinduism, the oldest religion in the world, they are understood to mean sacred Sanskrit texts, especially the part of the Vedas that contains hymns about sacrificial rituals, or in Tantra (mantra yoga) formulas consisting of letters and syllables of the Sanskrit alphabet, whose meaning is seen in their special combinations with corresponding intonations, the content of Rudolf Steiner's meditation sayings consists of meaningful thought formations. On the other hand, he agrees with the Indian view that enlightenment is hidden in the mantra like a tree in a seed, and that as soon as enlightenment takes effect, the mantra is endowed with a wonderful power and develops the cosmic energy latent in it. Even if it goes on to say: "The Tantra believes that some of the main mantras were not created by human brains, but exist eternally, and that the aspirant attains perfection by reciting them,”⁴⁴ this coincides with his statement that the meditation formulas are based on the “centuries of experience of the masters of wisdom and the harmony of sensations,” which is why not every thought can be used as meditation material, “but only those given by the masters of wisdom and the harmony of sensations.” (Berlin, January 28, 1908, GA 96). Tantric “recitation,” on the other hand, has become an inner form of speaking and listening appropriate to the modern level of consciousness.

Although the home of mantrism is rightly seen in ancient India, other ancient cultures were also aware of the occult power of speech sounds until well into Christian times.⁴⁵ However, according to spiritual scientific research, its actual origin lies far beyond ancient Indian culture, back to Atlantis. At that time, in a great school of adepts that had its heyday in the fourth, the so-called Turanian epoch, its adepts first developed what is now called “the occult script, also the occult language or occult speech,” which was then passed on by students to the present day.⁴⁶ At this primitive stage of mantra practice, the great power that lay in the words at that time was able to have a tremendous effect. Since the Atlanteans had not yet developed their intellect, the leaders of the mysteries were able to put their disciples into a state in which they could be directly enlightened by the deity itself through combinations of sounds, signs, and formulas. This was no longer possible after the great Atlantean flood. As a result of the profound change in consciousness that this brought about, it was now necessary to begin translating the unified Atlantean primordial wisdom into the intellectual, conceptual realm and to teach it in a way that was appropriate to the variously developing cultures of the peoples. (Leipzig, February 17, 1907, and Düsseldorf, March 7, 1907, both GA 97).

This also necessitated a new stage in the practice of mantras. In order to attain higher knowledge, it was now necessary to train the breathing process in yoga, since at that time the thought still lived in deeper regions of human nature than the word. Only gradually did the thought rise to the word, just as it has now risen beyond the word. (Vienna, June 3, 1922, GA 83). This gradual ascent of thought into the realm of words meant that experience was gradually directed away from the breathing process as such and toward the words carried by the breath. And so it began that what was revealed in words that were, in a sense, lifted out of the breathing process was expressed in “simple, word-heavy sayings.” In doing so, people strove to live entirely within the “sound of words,” within the “tone of words.” (Dornach, October 2, 1920, evening, GA 322).

In this sense, Arthur Avalon, who is considered a classical Western expert on Indian mantra teachings, describes a mantra as “power in sound form.”⁴⁷ For what is generally called a mantra “are the special sounds used in worship and practice, consisting of certain letters or letters arranged in a certain sequence of sounds, of which they are the representative signs.”⁴⁸

—Hella Wiesberger

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The strong dominance of the tonal-musical in the oriental mantra practice is also emphasized by Blavatsky. The “mystical language,” she says, resides in the mantra, or rather in its sounds [the sounds of the speech sounds], for sound is the "first key that opens the gate of communication between mortals and immortals.”⁴⁹ In the West, however, there is little or no mental image “of the forces hidden in sound, in the akashic vibrations that can be excited by those who know how to pronounce certain words.” With regard to the best-known Indian mantra formula “Aum,” it is explained: “Om is naturally Aum, which can be pronounced in two, three, or seven syllables and stimulates different vibrations. [...] The seven meanings and the seven effects depend on the intonation given to the whole formula and to each of its syllables.”⁵⁰ Rudolf Steiner devoted an entire lecture to this ancient Eastern prayer or formula of knowledge (Dornach, April 1, 1922, GA 211). In it, he describes how, in ancient Eastern yoga training, the inner vault of the head was originally explored using the vowel sound placed in the inhaled air, which is between a and o or between a and u. Because this is a reflection of the entire universe, it reveals the world word, that which creatively and constructively permeates and interweaves the world. In exhalation, with the consonant sound m, the confession to the world word was then breathed out in absolute devotion to the universe. And thus it was possible to recognize: “Inhalation is revelation, exhalation is confession, and ‘aum’ is the summary of revelation and confession, the enlivening of the world mystery within oneself, the confession of this world mystery within oneself.” How the path to this experience has changed in the present era is described as follows: "The tone has moved further up. The tone lives out in real, concrete thoughts, not in intellectual ones. So we can say: Inhalation becomes thought, and exhalation becomes the willful living out of thought. This means that we break down what was once inhalation as revelation and exhalation as confession into thought exercises and will exercises, and thereby obtain—also in thought, but in the thought practiced in meditation—the revelation, and in the will exercises, which are carried out on the other side, the confession of what has been revealed. For the newer humanity, it is like this: what was previously experienced in the mere breathing process, and what was formed in the inhalation process into vowel sounds and in the exhalation process into consonant sounds, lives on in a more soulful way in the inwardly contemplated thought, which is, however, permeated by the will in devotional surrender to the universe. Thus, the process is the same, only spiritualized, internalized. But here, too, the process consists in perceiving the inner experience of the universe in its mysteries and professing one's belief in this universe, in the spiritual foundation of this universe. Whereas the ancient Eastern sages were able to attain the highest inspiration through their breathing and mantra exercises because melos and the inner experience of the breathing process are essentially connected (Dornach, September 29 and December 2, 1922, GA 283, and Dornach, October 2, 1920, evening, GA 322), modern people seeking inspiration must, through purely spiritual exercises, transform what is otherwise a “mere logical connection” into a “musical connection within the thought itself.” (Dornach, May 27, 1922, GA 212). This is clearly stated in relation to the difference between the Eastern and Western approaches to mantras: If, in Eastern mantras, “a music living in these sayings is heard or spoken in the soul,”, in Western development this must happen in a spiritual-soul manner, so that we do not “fall into such singing or reciting of mantric sayings or repetitions.” (Berlin, February 28, 1918, GA 67). All this shows that the practice of mantra exercises is also subject to developmental changes. The fundamental impact of the Christ event on mantra exercises was once expressed in an esoteric lecture and recorded in the notes of one participant: "Through the Word becoming flesh, the method of teaching in the esoteric schools also changed. In pre-Christian times, the Word was not yet effective. Teaching was done in silence, and silently, through images, the student received messages from the spiritual worlds through contemplation. [...] In the esoteric schools of the present time, which rightly exist and have the Christ force at their center, teaching can now take place through the word. In the past, communication with the divine-spiritual worlds could only be achieved through mantras, through sound; but now, through the meaningful word, human beings can initiate union with the Christ force within themselves. Winged messengers shall be the words that carry human beings up into the spiritual worlds." (Esoteric Hour, Munich, December 5, 1909, GA 266/I). In a lecture given shortly afterwards, this is explained using the example of the Christian prayer, the Lord's Prayer: "The sevenfold nature of man was made clear to the disciples of the Turanian adepts by means of a tone scale symbolizing the seven members of the human being, mixed with certain color concepts and an aroma scale. What lay in the seven-membered scale of harmony arose in him as an inner experience, for which what was outwardly present was only a means. The great founders of religion poured this into certain formulas, and the greatest of them poured it into the Lord's Prayer, and everyone who prays the Lord's Prayer has the effect of the Lord's Prayer. The Lord's Prayer is a prayer that as such is not a mantra [in the sense of a letter exercise]. It will still have its meaning when thousands and thousands of years have passed, for it is a thought mantra. The effect of the Lord's Prayer has been poured into the thoughts. The effect of the Lord's Prayer is there, for it lies in the power of the thoughts themselves. (Berlin, February 18, 1907, GA 9%). "Everyone who prays the Lord's Prayer has its effect. It is not a mantra in the true sense, although it can have mantric powers. It is a thought mantra. Of course, it had the greatest power in the original language [Aramaic]. But since it is a thought mantra, it will not lose its power even if it is translated into a thousand languages." (Leipzig, February 17, 1907, GA 96). This formulation indicates that there must be a huge difference between the untranslatable letter mantras of the East and the spiritual scientific thought mantras.⁵¹ The extent to which the term “thought mantra” corresponds to the present stage of the general language development process and thus must also apply to the essence of Rudolf Steiner's mantric sayings is revealed in the significant remarks made in the lecture given in Dornach on April 13, 1923, GA 224, on the developmental process that human speech has undergone since its emergence in the Atlantean epoch to the present day: the progression from a “language of the will” in the Atlantean epoch to a “language of feeling” in the post-Atlantean epoch up to the Greek era, and to a “language of thought” in our epoch. With the loss of the experience of the creative forces of the essence of speech sounds and the ability to develop language in a living way, which occurred for the sake of human freedom, this great evolutionary movement has come to an end. A new impulse is needed. It can only be the Christ impulse, which has been decisive for the development of the earth since the Mystery of Golgotha. This means spiritualization, i.e., involution. If the path taken so far has been from the word to thinking, then spiritualization must first begin with thinking and from there strive back to the actual word-forming forces: “The path must be sought from the concept to the word, for there lies a completely different inner experience when, without speaking outwardly, we have not merely an abstract conceptual content inwardly, but the living experience of the sound, in whatever language it may be.” (Dornach, September 30, 1921, morning, GA 343). A completely different, special kind of language-forming power will then emerge, and the Christ impulse itself will be able to become the creative force of language. (Dornach, April 13, 1923, GA 224, and Pforzheim, March 7, 1914, GA 152).

A corresponding new mantra culture could only be inaugurated with thought mantras, in which the content of the thoughts intended for meditation is cast into linguistic sounds that are adequate to them. Looking at Rudolf Steiner's entire work from this background, he can be recognized not only as a great spiritual researcher and teacher, but also as a great artist in the creation of words that convey the spirit, thanks to his great efforts to shape language in writing and speech, in his poetry and mantras, and above all in the movements of speech sounds that he made visible for the new movement art of eurythmy. not only as a great spiritual researcher and teacher, but also as a great artist in the shaping of words that convey spirit.