Faust, the Striving Human Being

GA 272 — 20 August 1916, Dornach

11. The Historical Significance of “Faust”

after eurythmy-dramatic presentations: “Dedication”, “Prelude to the Theater”, “Prologue in Heaven”

Yesterday and on other occasions, I have spoken about the fact that Goethe's Mephistopheles is fundamentally a contradictory figure. We also already know why he is a contradictory figure. One could say that Mephistophelean, that is, Ahrimanic and Luciferic character traits are combined in him in a colorful jumble. Goethe, one might say, was not yet able to distinguish these character traits. If, on the one hand, one values a work of art as highly as you have seen me do with 'Faust', then one may also draw attention to such factual things. It remains strange, however, that so little has been noted about the contradictions in the poetry itself, although it has been done in individual cases. This is also a sign of the way in which things are often received today: one does not approach them with sufficient inner participation, so as to notice the inner life and activity. For if one did, one would soon have to notice, for example, the inner contradictions in the figure of Mephistopheles.

Let us take, first of all, a contradiction that may not be complete, but is nevertheless very strong, and which might be noticed immediately when one hears Mephistopheles speak in the scene that has just passed before our soul.

I see only how people toil.
The little god of the world always remains of the same ilk,
And is as whimsical as on the first day.
He would live a little better
If you had not given him the glow of heavenly light;
He calls it reason and uses it alone,

Only to be more animalistic than any animal. What must one feel when Mephistopheles criticizes the fact that man does it this way? Now, no one would credit Mephistopheles with very deep, selfless goals. He can't, even after this first scene in “Prologue in Heaven.” For what does Mephistopheles actually want? He wants Faust, doesn't he? He wants him for himself and so basically has to approve of everything Faust does in order to get together with him, to grasp him, to take hold of him. In this case, to take hold means to seize, not to understand; it is not meant conceptually, abstractly. “Can you grasp him?” – can you seize him? Mephistopheles will want to do everything to do so. It would suit him very well if Faust had all the qualities that would bring him into the very claws of Mephistopheles!

Let us turn to a later verse, where Mephistopheles confronts Faust himself in the study, where Faust speaks of his attitude towards reason and science. Faust leaves; Mephistopheles remains in his long robe. One can imagine that he will now be honest with himself, this Mephistopheles. So he says:

Despise reason and science,
Man's highest power,
Let only in Blend- and Zauberwerken
You from the lying spirit strengthen,
So I have you already unconditional.

So that could suit him just fine, when man does not apply reason and science in the right sense, but uses them to be more animalistic than any animal. Then he will just talk the Lord into it, won't he:

If thou hadst not given him the semblance of heavenly light;
He calls it reason and uses it alone,
Only to be more animal than any animal.

I say it is not a complete contradiction, but it is a strong contradiction for the senses.

In the scene I just quoted, where Mephistopheles stands opposite Faust in the study, it is clear that he is speaking sincerely as Ahriman-Mephistopheles. But in the passage you heard today:

He calls it reason and needs it alone,
Only to be more beastly than any beast,

a Luciferian trait comes into it. Lucifer cannot approve of Faust using reason to incite the animal passions. But Ahriman would have to approve if Faust behaved as Mephisto criticizes him for doing. In this case, we have not a half-contradiction, but a three-quarters contradiction!

But what are we to make of another passage?

As long as he lives on earth,
so long do not forbid it.
Man errs, so long as he strives. I thank you for that; for with the dead
I have never been willing to associate myself.
Most of all I love my own full, fresh cheeks.
I am not at home with a corpse;
I feel like a cat with a mouse.

If you compare that with the scene that we might also be able to perform one day, where Mephisto finally tries so hard to get the soul, in the second part, when the corpse is lying there, how are we supposed to cope at all? The devil is after souls, and here he is talking about the opposite! There are many such contradictions. I only wanted to give two examples; the first is a three-quarter contradiction that is found in the poetry itself. Such contradictions can certainly be attributed to the fact that the two character traits, the Luciferian and the Ahrimanic-Mephistophelian, get mixed up.

Now the question may arise for us: how is it that Goethe actually places Ahriman-Mephistopheles at Faust's side, directing all attention to Ahriman-Mephistopheles and, as it were, still suppressing Lucifer altogether? — That must surely be a question. For the fact that Goethe, under the influence of his time, was tempted to place Mephistopheles at Faust's side means that he has also taken on Luciferian traits and thus, so to speak, blamed Mephistopheles-Ahriman for everything that should be divided between the two. Thus there must be reasons in the time to turn more attention to Mephistopheles than to Lucifer. By treating the Faust saga, Goethe goes back to the time when the Middle Ages collided with the modern era. And he has essentially absorbed the impulses of the time that arose from this clash between the Middle Ages and the modern era. If we consider somewhat more ancient poetry, poetry that follows more ancient impulses, we find an opposite confusion. We can also talk about this some other time. But today I just want to hint at it. In Milton's 'Paradise Lost', you will find the opposite mistake made. Everything that should have been attributed to Ahriman-Mephistopheles is dumped on Lucifer, although not in such a crude way as it is done in “Faust”. As I said, we will talk about this some other time. It was more of a mistake that the Middle Ages made, to focus more on Lucifer. And the mistake that the modern era makes is to focus more on Ahriman-Mephistopheles. Now we live in a time in which the correct relationship between the two world powers, Mephistopheles and Lucifer, must be more and more recognized by people. Hence our group, our sculptural group, which is intended for the building here and which is to show the Ahrimanic and the Luciferic – Mephistopheles and Lucifer – in the right relationship to each other in pictorial form.

If you want to understand what it is actually about, you have to consider something that still seems quite paradoxical to people today, but which will one day, when people do not really reject spiritual science from their earthly existence, be deeply understood. We live in modern times under very special impulses, under which we have to live. It is right that we live under these impulses. We must only recognize these impulses. We must not mistake them. I have often explained how the Copernican world view had to arise at the beginning of modern times, how it is justified, deeply justified. We have somewhat different feelings about this Copernican world view than the external world has. For if one considers the feelings with which the external world faces the Copernican world view, one can hardly come to any other conclusion than that people say: Well, the Middle Ages and antiquity were stupid, and we have become clever, and when the Middle Ages and antiquity were stupid, they thought that the sun moved and constructed all kinds of cycles and epicycles — the Ptolemaic worldview — and then believed that, assumed the movements of the heavenly bodies according to appearances. In a certain sense, this is even true for the Middle Ages, especially for the later Middle Ages, because confusion had already crept into what had emerged as the Ptolemaic worldview. But the original Ptolemaic world view was not like that; it was part of the original ancient revelation, had come into human souls through the ancient mysteries and by no means through mere external observation, and was therefore based on revelation. With this revelation, modern times broke, and modern times asked the question: How should one look at the sky in order to get to know it and its movements? — Copernicus first did the calculations, tried to make a simple calculation of the movements of the heavenly bodies, and then showed how the positions that were calculated actually corresponded to the positions of the heavenly bodies. And so, by way of calculation, he invented his Copernican system, formulated three theorems that can be found in Copernicus' works themselves, about the movements of the heavenly bodies in relation to our Earth. Of these three propositions, however, one was left out, and that is how the present-day confused Copernican view of the world came about, which is not that of Copernicus himself. The third was inconvenient – so it was left out! Therefore, anyone who merely learns the Copernican view of the world from the usual books does not know the view of Copernicus at all. But that was bound to happen. First, Copernicus had to establish a far more correct doctrine with his three propositions. Then our teaching had to come, which is based on two of Copernicus's propositions. Only when the whole matter is thoroughly penetrated in spiritual-scientific terms will the right thing emerge.

Then came those who sought to understand the movements of the heavenly bodies and their laws in a more external way, not through calculation. The telescope came. People learned to examine the sky as they examined things on earth. And in this way modern astronomy and modern astrophysics arose, a science that arises entirely from the fact that what is observed is expressed in laws; that is, one wants to explain the sky by observing the sky. And what could be more natural than this? Modern man must think that anyone who wanted to know anything other than the heavens by observing the heavens must be a completely crazy fellow. That is quite obvious, isn't it. And yet it is not correct, but it is one of the great deceptions. It is something that will be quite different in the future. In the future, too, people will consult the heavens even more than they do now, wanting to learn about the movements that live and breathe in the heavenly bodies. They will study the heavens carefully and intently, but they will know one thing that we do not know today, that seems completely paradoxical to us when we say it out loud: You learn nothing about the heavens by observing them. The most false method of getting to know the sky and its movements is to observe it as one does today. — No, I am saying something completely twisted. But one must relate to the distortions differently than the good Christian von Ehrenfels, to whom I referred eight days ago, related to them. One will observe the sky, observe it more and more thoroughly and let it tell one its secrets. But what will these secrets reveal in the distant future? They will reveal what is happening here on earth. That is what they will reveal. People will observe the sky, but they will explain from what they recognize in the sky how plants grow on earth, how animals come into being on earth, everything that forms on earth, everything that lives and weaves on earth. The information that heaven reveals will provide enlightenment about this. It will no longer occur to anyone to ask heaven about heaven, but rather they will ask heaven in order to find enlightenment about the earth. And the most significant laws that one will learn about from heaven will be used to reveal the secrets of earthly existence. Old astrology, which is little recognized today in its original meaning and which has largely become amateurish, even charlatanistic, will be revived in a completely new form. Not only will earthly destinies be sought in the movements of the stars and in the laws of the heavens, but the laws of earthly life, that which lives and moves, will be explained in terms of the laws of the heavenly bodies. One will not know why salt crystallizes in cubes, why diamond crystallizes in octahedrons, and so on, before one explains that which has forms here on earth from the positions of the heavenly bodies. And the secret of the life of animals, plants and human beings will not be known as the secret of life until the movements of the heavenly bodies, whose effect is life, can be used to explain what lives and moves here on earth. The earth is explained from the heavens. Admittedly, what is known about heaven will take on a somewhat different form from what is claimed to be known today. The laws of the positions and movements of the heavenly bodies will be investigated. But then one will let oneself be inspired meditatively by what one investigates in order to enter into a relationship, so to speak, with the beings that live in the stars. One will let oneself be told by the beings that live there what one will need to know for life on earth.

That is a future prospect. You now know that in a similar way to how Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler, who, incidentally, still had old ideas flowing in their minds, tried to discover the laws of celestial motion by observing the heavens, and how this was continued in their spirit in more recent times, so Darwin, Lamarck and Haeckel tried to find the laws of earthly life. And what would be more natural here than to get to know the earth through the earth! You travel around, as Darwin did, you use a microscope, as Haeckel did, you rationalize, as Lamarck did, about the creatures of the earth and try to recognize the laws by which life on earth is governed. On the other hand, you can be considered a crank if you don't see it as a matter of course. The future will not see it as a matter of course at all! If you consider the straight, beautiful course of development that modern biology has taken from Darwin to Haeckel and to Haeckel's students, you will find that it has led to the formation of certain laws, especially about embryonic life. The so-called biogenetic law plays an important role, that in embryonic life, man follows the individual animal species. You know that I have often drawn attention to the biogenetic law. In order to find this, such observations were made in the hope of finding something about the life of living beings. We may say that the present time is again occupied with the dissection of these views, only that it is little noticed in lay circles. Copernican astronomy is already strongly doubted by individual more insightful people. And Haeckel's student, Oscar Hertwig, has expressed things in his last writings that are likely to call into question everything that the Darwin-Haeckel theory has brought to the surface. If you educate yourself from what is happening within the field of science, you get a different view than if you educate yourself only according to what is offered to the public in popular lectures by the usual lecturers – well, I dare not say Mauthner, how should I put it? Much is already happening in the actual specialized science, and what is given here as a future perspective is already being prepared. Only one will have to come to spiritual science, so that what is going on does not become confused, but really appropriate.

Now I must again say something that is paradoxical. By observing what is happening on earth, you do not learn anything about the earth; you will learn that one day when you read from the stars what is happening on earth. But what actually happens out there in space, that is learned through the observation of, for example, embryology and so on. One can treat this observation in turn as I have indicated before, that one observes the movements of the sky; one can enter into a relationship with the elementary beings that regulate these movements within the events on earth. Just as one will ask the heavens to explain the earth, so one will ask the earth to explain the heavens. As I said, it is still paradoxical today, but it will come, in some way it will come over this earth, that this correct view will take hold. Astronomers will establish biology by the means of their science, and biologists will establish astronomy by the means of their science. And a biology truly founded on the data of astrology will be spiritual science, and an astrology founded on the data of true embryology will be spiritual astronomy. When you consider this, you must say to yourself: Humanity does not follow a straight line of development, but moves forward, as it were, in waves, in a wavy line, up and down. And in order to prepare the right spiritual view that had to come, error had to arise, which consists in wanting to explain heaven by heaven and earth by earth in modern times. People lived under this impression.

But Goethe did not live entirely under this impression, not entirely. In a sense, Goethe had pre-Darwinized Darwinism, but his was a much more spiritual Darwinism. He did not just focus on the external sensory sequence of phenomena, but on the primal plant and the primal animal. And I have often referred to the well-known conversation between Goethe and Schiller, where Goethe, after they had seen how plants were viewed side by side at the botanist Batsch's in Jena, and Schiller found this unsatisfactory, sketched out the so-called primal plant with a few strokes. This picture by Goethe does not exist. In the introduction to Goethe's morphological writings in Kürschner's National-Literatur, which I wrote in the 1880s, I tried to trace this Goethean primal plant. You can find it there as I have traced it. Schiller, however, said: That is not reality, that is an idea. — Goethe said: Then I see my idea with eyes. He was clear about the fact that this was an intuition for him, an experience, not something thought up, something rationalized. And if you get to know Goethe that way, get to know him quite intimately, whether it is through his poetic endeavors in connection with his scientific ones, or whether it is the other way around, in his scientific endeavors in connection with his poetic ones – I have just interpretation of Goethe, one sees how Goethe does not feel quite comfortable explaining heaven by heaven and earth by earth, and how this principle of modern times is continually being broken through in his ideas. That is why it is so difficult to understand Goethe's theory of colors today, because what Goethe actually wants is an astronomical explanation of the secret of colors. And if you read Goethe's Morphology very carefully, you will see how certain things come into play that originate from the very beginnings of astronomy. This is particularly evident when you consider Goethe's essays on the spiral tendency of plants. Now, that would lead to details, which I can only draw attention to today; I just want to point them out.

Let us now raise the question: how is it that this more recent period, which we have been calculating since the clash of the Middle Ages with the modern age, since the advent of Copernicanism, Galileism, Keplerism, and which we have been following up to Darwinism, to Haeckelism, to Lamarckism, how is it that this time considers explaining the heavens by the heavens, the earth by the earth, instead of the earth by the heavens and the heavens by the earth? How is that? — It is due to a twofold seduction, in that Ahriman as well as Lucifer seduce people. In the Middle Ages, when things were being prepared, when people were heading towards Copernicanism, Darwinism, it was more of a Luciferic activity, it was Luciferic impulses that prepared that. And when Copernicanism had emerged, it was more of an Ahrimanic seduction. It is Ahriman who essentially lives in people by carrying out this reversal of people that I have spoken of. For ultimately, modern science is entirely under Ahrimanic influence. And Goethe sensed correctly when he felt that Ahriman was close to the person, to Mephistopheles, in modern times. For him it was less important to consider the relationship of Lucifer to man than that of Ahriman to man. His particular attention had to be directed towards this. The Luciferic influence was of less importance to him. For Faust is presented from the very beginning of the story as the man of modern times. The various aberrations of theology at the end of the Middle Ages stemmed from Lucifer. But Faust appears on the scene by placing the Bible under the bench and declaring himself to be a man of the world and a physician, that is, he wants to explain the earth by means of the earth and heaven by means of heaven, not as was the case with the old theologians of the late Middle Ages, who still tried, as a last atavism, to explain the wonders of the earth from the revelations of theology, that is, to explain them from heaven. In more recent times, Ahriman appeared at man's side. Those who felt this, but who were not imbued with the necessity, but only permeated with the fear of the devil, therefore blasphemed the Faust, who only followed the necessary impulse of modern times. And so the sixteenth-century Faust legend came into being, which has Faust burnt and consigned to hell because he falls prey to Ahriman. Those who still lived under the atavism of the Middle Ages gave this form to the legend, as it were. Goethe was no longer under the influence of the Middle Ages. Therefore he did not have his Faust burnt and consigned to hell. But he did pose the big question: What should actually be done?

Let us look at the matter quite specifically. What do we actually do when we explain the earth through the earth? Let us grasp it with an example that is perhaps a little removed from ordinary science and therefore perhaps closer to us. Let us take a myth or a piece of fiction and think of a commentator or an interpreter of the kind I have often criticized – you remember! Let us assume that such a commentator, an interpreter of a myth, a saga or a piece of fiction, steps before us and explains, as he says, the piece of fiction from the piece of fiction; he seeks the laws of the piece of fiction in the piece of fiction or in the myth. He can be very ingenious. There are indeed very ingenious interpreters of myths and poetry. But they all err, for one can never explain a myth or a poem by applying one's intellect to it. Oh, the things the interpreters of Hamlet have written in order to interpret “Hamlet”! And what have the interpreters of Faust written in order to interpret Faust! What have the theosophists done in order to interpret all kinds of myths! One can only get to the bottom of myths and the bottom of poetry if one knows how to direct one's gaze to where myths and poetry come from — from heaven. This again points to that future perspective. This is closer to us than to point this out in science. Myths are cited by illustrating through them, so to speak, when one has come to understand the great connections in the heavenly universe; one then allows them to be reflected through the myths, at least. And when one has insight into the cosmic laws that prevail, then one will not come to intellectual commentary skills in the face of poetry; because when one peels out of the myth and the poetry that what such intellectual commentators usually get, what actually occurs there? Yes, you can always have a certain image in front of you when a myth explainer or a poetry commentator appears in the way they do today. Something emerges, like the one who emerged in his bat form, really something bat-like and gray, in contrast to the living life that is in poetry and myth. There one also makes the acquaintance of Ahriman-Mephistopheles.

What I have just mentioned as an example could be extended to cover all the goings-on in science, although I am not criticizing science. I want to show you the necessity for it. Ahriman had to intervene for a certain length of time, otherwise the way people worked in the Middle Ages would have become one that would have allowed people to become lethargic all too easily. People like to have absolute peace, so the world admits the devil, who works and entices and, as a devil, must create - he tempts and entices and works. This intervention of Ahriman is necessary. And it is utter nonsense to have heard something about Ahriman and Lucifer and then ask: “Is this perhaps an ahrimanic influence? Is this a luciferic influence?” One must guard against this!

Goethe understood the role of Ahriman! But why did Ahriman have to play such a role in modern times? Why did Ahriman-Mephistopheles have to enter the sphere of man at all? We know that evolution proceeds in such a way that we have the so-called Lemurian time, the Atlantic time, our post-Atlantic time. We know that in the Lemurian time, the human I, that is, consciousness, was still quite inactive, still quite inactive; it is only just beginning here.

But only gradually does man become enlightened about the I-impulse that lives and moves in him. Only gradually do people become clear about their position when the I dwells in their soul, about Lucifer and Ahriman. Only gradually do they become clear, people. If we visualize the principle that must guide the future era, it presents itself, schematically indicated, as pointing towards the earth to discover the secrets of heaven, and towards heaven to discover the secrets of the earth. If one does things the wrong way, if one does things in the sense of our time, then one does not find the secrets of the earth, but out of the earth comes, instead of the laws of heaven, instead of the secrets of heaven, which should come out, comes the Ahrimanic, which approaches man, which tries to approach man. It must be rejected, because what the earth gives must not be sought intellectually in the earth, but what it reveals for heaven. Lucifer comes from the cosmic space; he must go away. If he were to approach man, it would be that what is not found in him would be sought in the cosmic space outside: the secrets of heaven itself. This relationship must be understood.

Once upon a time, people had to understand how close Lucifer is to man. It has been made possible for people to understand this in a symbol that is much more than a symbol, in a symbol that points deep into the secrets of the spiritual world. If one wants to characterize what Lucifer means for humanity as a whole, one cannot make this more intimate than by presenting the matter in such a way that Lucifer approaches the powers of woman and, with the help of specifically female powers, influences the world, and man is then seduced by woman with the help of Lucifer. This symbol had to be presented to humanity, and it had to be there when the fourth post-Atlantean period began, when people should first understand the relationship between Lucifer and man, when they should feel it, sense it, become aware of it. There is no better way to become aware of the relationship between Lucifer and man than to study the beginning of the Bible, how the serpent approaches the woman, how the woman seizes her powers and thus begins the seduction, the temptation of the world. This significant symbol was the most effective for this fourth post-Atlantean cultural period, even though it had existed earlier. The mystery of Lucifer is contained in this symbol.

The fifth post-Atlantean period had to consciously enlighten man about the Ahrimanic-Mephistophelian mystery. Another symbol had to take its place. Just as the symbol of the Luciferic tempter of woman stands at the head of the religious book, which deals with the spiritual world, and man is thereby also seduced by the arts that Lucifer performs with the help of woman, so the counter-image had to arise in the fifth post-Atlantean period: Ahriman, who approaches man, initially seduces man, and with man's help, woman. Even if it was not so brilliantly achieved in the first part of the Faust epic, the deeply moving nature of the Gretchen tragedy is often based on the fact that just as Adam is seduced by Lucifer in a roundabout way through Eve, so Gretchen is seduced by Ahriman-Mephistopheles in a roundabout way through Faust. Necessity dictated that the World Book should be contrasted with the Book of Theology: the seduced and the seducer; the seduced and the seducer; Lucifer, Ahriman. The relation of Lucifer to woman on the one hand, and of Ahriman to man on the other. This is a deeply significant spiritual connection.

And therefore this world book of Faust, in contrast to the theology book, was really created out of an inner spiritual impulse. And the newer time is called upon to find the paths between Ahriman and Lucifer. For all the forces through which Lucifer works in the world are not the same as, but similar to, the forces through which he succeeded in seducing woman. All the forces through which Ahriman works in the world are similar to the forces with which he seduces man. And just as we correctly imagine the luciferic seduction that the Bible presents to us in the Lemurian period, so we must seek Ahriman in a place in the Bible that is no longer clear because the Ahrimanic secret in the Bible is not yet revealed in the same way as the luciferic secret. While we are placing the Luciferic mystery in the Lemurian time, we must, as I have often explained, place the Ahrimanic mystery in the Atlantean time. The Bible only hints at this, not with such a clear and radiant image as that of the temptation in Paradise. The Bible only says that the impulses that came into earthly existence caused the sons of the gods to take pleasure in the daughters of men. This is only a hint at what comes in as an Ahrimanic impulse.

Goethe's “Faust” already has a certain historical significance. And this historical significance lies in what I have tried to sketch out for you today. If we want to draw attention to what spiritual science wants to become and should become for humanity, we often have to express paradoxes today, express things that seem strange to many people. But it is true. When human beings will one day arrive at a state where their science will recall the original revelation by explaining earthly life from the secrets of heaven, when earthly science will be such that the deepest secrets of heaven can be recognized in the formation of embryonic development, then mankind will have found the right relationship to Ahriman and Lucifer, and then, in a certain way, that in humanity will be realized which is to be represented in our main group in the structure, in which the representative of humanity is placed between Ahriman and Lucifer in the right gesture.

We shall have to understand more and more deeply what is contained in Goethe's Faust. But we shall need an interpretation that is not dependent on authority. Those people who want to arrive at knowledge only by making, as a lady in our society once said, “a face all the way to their stomachs” in order to express their inner soul mood will not reach their goal. It was a lady who was not accustomed to speaking German and therefore made this linguistic error. But that is not the point; it was a correct description. She wanted to point out those people who lack any possibility of developing humor in their perception of the world. If one cannot develop humor, then under certain circumstances it can become quite dire. So it will have to be that one has to find one's way in the world in the way I have characterized it. Those people who only want to approach the things of the world in a sentimental mood will naturally prefer to be able to understand a work of art such as Goethe's 'Faust' in such a way that they can make 'a face up to their stomachs' at every line. But people who want to understand Faust will have to grasp it without authority. Then they will have to work their way through the contradictions, but working through the contradictions will offer the possibility of understanding. Something like the Prologue on High is no child's play! If one is too afraid of a certain irony and a certain humor towards the world, then one easily falls prey to the greatest humorist, who is a comrade of the one who confronts us in Goethe's Mephistopheles, who is more of a burden to the Lord than a prankster, who is a somewhat more dangerous spirit of the kind that can deny.

I would like to suggest that such things, which already occupy an exceptional position in the spiritual development of mankind, be grasped more deeply. For they are also a way of penetrating into the secrets beyond the threshold, where everything is different from this side of the threshold, where everything is such that one must already become familiar with it, that some things sound paradoxical, which are spoken out of the consciousness of those facts that lie beyond the threshold to the spiritual world. The present time does not want to know much about the secrets that lie beyond the threshold to the spiritual world. Most people today are indeed always convinced that we have come so gloriously far. Well, I don't know how far people will be able to maintain this conviction through our immediate time, which has come so gloriously far and yet only lives in the consequences of what it has believed through the centuries. But even if what is proclaimed from the other side of the threshold sounds paradoxical to many people today, more and more understanding must be formed for these mysteries of existence. And much of the beneficial development of humanity into the future depends on people finding understanding for what still sounds so paradoxical in so many ways.

It may still seem foolish to the world to say that the earth must be explained through heaven, heaven through the earth. He who looks into the compelling destiny of man, which reveals itself from beyond the threshold, knows that what appears so foolish and paradoxical to people is nevertheless wisdom in the sight of the spiritual and the world. And today it may be said without becoming immodest, because when one says it out of the consciousness of the spiritual world, one already has the necessary humility to be allowed to say it, because this humility already exists in the heart , although one may have to use strength to express what one would most like to express in a gesture of humility, in a gesture of the necessary strength, which might give the appearance of a gesture of arrogance. But only an Ahrimanic view could find fault with that, confusing humility and arrogance in this case. More about that another time.