The Dornach Building

GA 287 — 12 October 1914, Dornach

Fifth Lecture

Yesterday we spoke about how that which lives in human beings should come to the fore in our building, how the impulses of will, feeling, and thinking should find expression in it.

Now, from various things that have been discussed here over the last few days, it will be clear to you that the artistic element in our building should contain something new, something that has not been present in the artistic evolution of humanity up to now, but which is necessary for the further evolution of humanity and must therefore, as it were, be incorporated into this human evolution from now on.

However, it will be difficult to understand what is actually intended with our building if one only wants to understand it from the outside, so to speak. The moment one wants to understand it from the outside, one will perhaps stand in front of this building and say to oneself: Yes, I can't really make sense of all this, I can't really do anything with all this. And from the standpoint of what we have been accustomed to regard as artistic, we will naturally criticize the building. Now, at all times in human development, criticism has been developed from the standpoint of the past about what has entered into human evolution as a new impulse.

Now, it may help us to understand what is important for us if we seek, so to speak, the “formula” that sums up in a few words the points of view for the renewal of the artistic principle through a truly anthroposophical worldview. When we survey artistic life, we can direct our gaze to the architectural forms that humanity has produced, either originally in Egyptian, Greek, or Gothic architecture, or we can direct our gaze to what represents, in a sense, the renewal of an earlier period in a later time, such as the Renaissance. In this way, we can consider sculpture, painting, and so on.

If we compare everything that affects our soul from the actual character of the arts with what is intended with our building, we can say that everything that is intended is, in a sense, as if it were called to life from a state of rest. One might say: one saw the artistic development of humanity before one's eyes and regarded it figuratively as a human being standing still in some gesture. And now someone comes and says something to this human being, and now the human being begins to walk, to move. This could be the case with the artistic development that we can trace up to our time. We can regard it as something standing there in a calm gesture, to which we would like to call out the magic word that will bring it to life, to inner life, to movement. We would like to do this with our entire spiritual scientific development, because this is demanded by the transitional impulses that are alive in our time and that call upon us to seek a new element for the future evolution of humanity.

It is different with the other pole of painting, the coloristic. Here we must bear in mind that the coloristic is a capturing of what is not actually present in nature, or at least can only be captured for a moment. In truth, one cannot really count as coloristic that which is “captured” in a being and which one paints in this way; for the painter who placed the main value on accurately reproducing, for example, the colors of the clothing of the people he paints would, of course, be a poor painter.

But basically, even a painter who, for example, wanted to express the inner vital conditions of the human organism in the color of the face would not be a good painter. Anyone who paints a pale face—I want to take the extreme case—in order to suggest with this pale face that the person painted in this way is perhaps ill inside, would not, in fact, be developing anything truly artistic with this; not to mention that it would be hardly artistic if someone wanted to paint a red nose on a wine drinker.

If one wants to capture in color something that is, as it were, stationary and expressed in a being, one is not really following artistic impulses. But if, say, one paints a cloud and expresses in the cloud the whole magic of nature—for example, the morning sun and the effect of the morning on the nuances of the cloud—then one is capturing something that passes in nature and does not come from within the individual being, the individual cloud. What you are capturing is therefore something that is transient, but which is grounded in the conditions of the entire environment, of the cosmos, insofar as it is relevant. When we paint a cloud that is correctly lit at a certain time of day, we are basically painting the whole world that is there at that time of day. When we paint a person and want to reproduce the whole constitution of their inner being, then, as I said, we are not actually engaged in artistic activity. But if we succeed in expressing what this person has experienced, if, for example, when painting a picture, we can depict something that causes a person to have a certain redness in their face, then we are already more involved in the artistic; and even more so as soon as we can see from the picture itself what the experience is, when the redness of the cheek tells us what the person must have gone through. So again, something that is not in the individual being, but in the whole environment, in the whole cosmos.

What I am saying here is related in a certain sense to what I discussed in the lectures on “Occult Reading and Occult Hearing,” where I said that the soul is actually always outside the body, even when we are awake, and that the body is only a mirror from which the human being brings to consciousness what lives outside in the cosmos. And only those who live outside with the things in the cosmos, so to speak, and for whom what they represent is actually only the impetus to reflect their life with the cosmos, are true artists.

When we paint a cloud, as I explained earlier with the example, we are actually outside the cloud with everything we feel and imagine, and the cloud is only the occasion for projecting onto a single being what lives in the whole cosmos. - But now, if we want to live with the cosmos in this way, we must, insofar as color is concerned, bring color to life, as it were. Colors appear to us, I would say, as properties of beings in the external world. We recognize colors in the objects of nature insofar as we observe purely on the physical plane. We need a background everywhere if we want to see colors, with the exception of the atmospheric phenomenon of a rainbow. That is why the phenomenon of the rainbow has been rightly regarded as something that connects the sky, the spiritual, with the earth, because in the rainbow we do not see the sky in color, but really see color as such.

I have pointed out in previous lectures that it is possible to immerse oneself in the flood of the world of colors and to live with colors, to detach color from the concrete and to live with color, as it were. When one detaches color from the concrete and lives with color, then color simultaneously becomes the revealer of deeper secrets, and a whole world lives in the flowing, surging sea of colors.

But then the need arises to detach the world of colors from the conditions imposed on it on the physical plane, and the need arises to seek the creative aspect of colors.

If painting is to fit organically into the whole of our building, then what unfolds pictorially in this building must live out of this impulse; then an attempt must be made, particularly in the coloristic elements, to represent that which does not live as color on the physical plane, where everything colorful—with the exception of the rainbow and the like—is only fixed in a concrete form. Then it must be possible, for example, to live in the blue with one's whole soul, as if the rest of the world did not exist, as if there were only blue and the soul felt itself flowing out into the blue that fills the whole world.

But what will emerge when one truly immerses oneself in the flowing, undulating world of color will not merely be a brushing of color tones; for one immerses oneself in the creativity of color, and when one immerses oneself in the creativity of color, one will find that this color is in fact differentiated internally. If you live in the blue and gradually find your way into it, you will find that the blue has something attractive to the soul, something in which our soul wants to lose itself, longing for it, wanting to long for it more and more. Then you will also find that figures emerge from it, figures that express the mysteries of the universe, that express the soul of the universe. From the creativity of color itself, a world will emerge, a world that configures itself, that differentiates itself internally, that lives itself out in its essence. Form will be born out of color. One will feel that one not only lives in color, but that color itself gives birth to form, that form is therefore the work of color.

In this way, through the detour of color, one will live one's way into the creative, into the creative power of the world. Only in this way can painting happen in such a way that the painterly not only covers the surface, but points out into the whole cosmos, lives life with the whole cosmos. In this way, we will have to grasp inwardly what was discussed yesterday as the necessary content of our dome painting — the impulses of Lemurian, Atlantean, and our post-Atlantean life in the ancient Indian, ancient Persian, Egyptian-Chaldean, and Greek-Latin cultures — so that from this inner grasp of color, which at the same time, as it passes into the work, becomes a grasp of form, that which lives in the evolution of humanity is grasped.

Anyone who looks at how painting has been done up to now will see that painting has tended to live in color, in colorism, just as color is attached to the representational on the physical plane. There will have to be a liberation, an emancipation of color from the concrete if what is to be created with our dome painting is to be created. It will therefore be a matter of a fundamental internalization and setting in motion of the painterly impulse.

It will be difficult to convey what is intended to our contemporaries. We will have to do without that for now. For as long as it is still possible to judge whether someone finds a work of art “right” or “good” or whatever, if it reminds them of something real, our paintings will remain incomprehensible. As long as people can say that a tree is well painted if it is as natural as possible, if one believes one is standing in front of something like a real tree, as long as this is the standard for judging the painterly and the artistic in general, as long as this is the case, people will not be able to understand anything about what we are supposed to paint. People will have to consider what we want to paint to be foolishness; they will not be able to find anything in it. For what have works of art always been there for? To be looked at! And who would ever have thought that works of art were there for anything other than to be looked at? What is to be created in our building will not be there to be looked at, not at all to be looked at! We can be glad if those people who, based on all their preconditions and preliminary studies, believe that works of art are for viewing, find our works of art as bad as possible. For it is certain that what these people do not want is precisely what we want!

Sometimes you can learn something very characteristic in this way. One of our friends once met me on the way from the glass studio to our apartment and told me that he had spoken to an old gentleman who said: If the person who came up with the idea for these domes had ever seen St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, he would have made these domes differently. Now, the person who came up with the idea for these domes had seen St. Peter's Basilica not just once, but many times, and was able to enjoy it and appreciate the grandeur of St. Peter's Basilica, and yet he designed the domes as they are now.

It is only natural that such judgments will be made, because St. Peter's Basilica is also there to be looked at. But what is being done here is not just for viewing, but for proper experience. And what would have been the answer to that old gentleman? The correct answer would have been to say to him: Do you know the fairy tale of the prince ... (gap in the transcript) who always looked at things only from his window? And do you know what happened when one day he “had to eat from the snake”? - Then he began to understand what the sparrows on the roofs and the chickens in the yard were talking about. - The old gentleman had obviously not “eaten from the snake.” What does it mean to “eat from the snake”? - It means not only to have looked into spiritual science theoretically, but to be seized by it with one's whole soul, in the innermost heart, so that one feels within oneself an image of this spiritual science. When one can feel this with one's whole inner being, then one has “eaten from the serpent,” and then one experiences what is intended for our constitution: one does not merely look at it, but experiences in it what is intended with it, experiences, as it were, how dull and unconscious the human being is in his will from incarnation to incarnation, being embodied in one incarnation in this people, in another incarnation in that people.

Just as one can experience in our building the impulses of human will in the progression from west to east in the advancing motifs of the columns, capitals, and architraves, so one can experience the emotional element of human beings in what develops from bottom to top; but one must experience it. And the thinking element, where thinking is not merely abstract, cold, sober thinking, but is enlivened by the heart of the cosmos itself: this should be experienced in the conclusion through the domes; but in such a way that it is experienced again in the details of the dome. When, for example, one color is next to another that never appears next to it in nature, when a being with human-like features appears with colors that could never appear in nature, then one must experience how what is expressed there brings the inner life to vivid expression.

If what is to be achieved is achieved to some extent, then for the first time – even if only in the very beginning – nothing will be as it is in nature, especially in painting, but all the more everything will be as it is in the spiritual realm.

And two things, my dear friends, must be achieved, two things to which very few in the present human race profess to adhere. It is truly not for the good of humanity that so many people still want to know nothing, absolutely nothing, about the great perspectives that lie in the evolution of humanity. You see, if one wants to feel in a concentrated way that for which our building is intended to be the symbol, then one must enliven oneself inwardly; one must enliven the soul through all kinds of feelings. It is not possible to express everything that is actually intended in a simple, easily comprehensible feeling; one must try to gather together what the soul should actually feel from the most diverse elements of feeling in the world.

Let us remember times other than the present. Let us remember the Greek horizon, without going further back, and let us consider in particular what was not yet there for the Greeks, but which is there for people today. What was not yet there for the Greeks? Well, the Greeks did not know America or Australia; they knew nothing of the western part of the earth. They also knew nothing of much that is now known about Europe, Asia, and Africa. Their horizon was geographically narrow. Try to imagine what one might feel when looking at the map that the Greeks could see. Try that, and then try to direct your feelings toward the rich world in which the Greeks lived, toward everything that was creative in the Greeks. Try to compare the geographical map of the heavens that the Greeks were still able to draw with today's map of the heavens. The map of the physical earth was quite small, but the map of the heavens was truly vast. What existed in Greek culture was essentially still a spiritual experience of the physical plane: geographically limited, but spiritually reaching out into the vastness of the heavens.

It was no longer the case with the Greeks, as it had been, for example, in the Egyptian-Babylonian-Chaldean period, when people looked out into the cosmos and still experienced something of the real spiritual beings whose physical expression is the stars in their astrological ideas. But a reflection of all this was still present in ancient Greece. When we read in Homer's Iliad how Thetis informs Achilles that Zeus cannot do anything now because he is in Ethiopia and will not return to his home for twelve days, this still has a connection to astrology, but in such a way that the reader does not notice that this description is based on the passage through the zodiac. When the Greeks said, “Zeus is with the Ethiopians,” they meant that he was in a certain sign of the zodiac. The number twelve also indicates this. All of this already has a hint of what it later became, but on the other hand, it is still imbued with what humans originally had in terms of the breadth of their spiritual horizon.

Now let us try to turn our gaze away from this Greek culture and direct it towards more recent times. Geographically, the globe is becoming more and more rounded, and today there are only a few areas that are, so to speak, completely blank spots on the globe. We see the modern era dawning. America is being incorporated into the geographical maps of the world by the peoples of the East, that America which did not yet exist for the Greeks. The geographical horizon is becoming ever wider, but the spiritual horizon, the map of the heavens, so to speak, is shrinking completely. What does modern man know about the people we encounter in Greek mythology? He knows nothing about them anymore! European man basically lives in his soul from the historical development of Greek culture, for whatever lies further back in history than Greek culture takes on a ghostly appearance for the historian, no matter how much it is researched from documents. When modern man absorbs the elements of Greek culture that are taught in schools, he absorbs history, and so our soul lives in the history that we have come to know externally. We actually carry a great deal of history with us, a great deal of history.

This is not the case with Asian people, nor is it the case with American people today. Even though they have their history, their history does not live in their lives, so to speak. American people live much more unhistorically than European people.

There will be few Americans who attach great importance to tracing their family tree back through the centuries. Probably very few. But in Europe there are quite a few. This is the carrying along of the historical element, on which so much depends in the whole configuration of life, including social life.

It is conceivable that in the distant future – more than conceivable for the occultist – everything that we have carried with us as history since Greek times will come to rest; we do not want to talk about where it rests; a time is conceivable when the wave of peoples will have rolled across Asia to Europe and America, and when people will know as little here on the physical plane about all that we now recount and experience as European history as we know today about what happened in Europe four to six thousand years ago. We can look forward to a time when this wave of peoples will have rolled across Asia, when a life quite different from today's will have developed, and when everything that moves us today to the innermost fibers of our hearts will lie, as it were, in historical-geological strata. It will then be as past to them as what happened on European soil three, four, or five millennia ago is past to us today.

The time will come when people will discover Goethe, so to speak, just as people today have discovered the ancient world in the first Egyptian hieroglyphs, just as they discovered what happened back then. For there will be people who will need to discover Goethe in this way.

We are looking at great and remarkable perspectives in the evolution of humanity. Just as the ancient Greeks knew nothing of America, so the descendants of today's Americans will know of the Greeks as something long past, or will know nothing in a certain respect, as I have now described.

The process I have just described as a more physical process also takes place, in a sense, in the spiritual realm. It takes place in the spiritual realm in such a way that, in the course of human evolution, human beings must grow toward the ability to rediscover the spiritual, to know in the future a spiritual world that is as unknown to most people today as America was unknown to the Greeks. We are at the beginning of this voyage of discovery to spiritual America. In this respect, we are spiritually where people were physically when the first ship sailed from the Old World to America. So we are spiritually on a journey of discovery to the other, spiritual half of our human existence.

I only wanted to emphasize the significance, the importance of what spiritual science should be in human evolution. For now everyone can supplement for themselves what still needs to be supplemented. Let us assume that America had not been discovered, that Europeans were still living without any knowledge of America. Is that conceivable? It is actually inconceivable! So a time will come when it will be unthinkable that human beings could ever have failed to discover the spiritual world in the sense of spiritual science. That will be completely unthinkable.

But the comparison can be taken a step further. What has come to humanity as a result of the expansion of the geographical horizon? If we seek the most ideal spiritual culture in its concreteness, as it has developed on Earth so far, we must look for it before the discovery of America. For with the discovery of America, materialism also begins. With every geographical expansion, the spread of materialism is also mysteriously connected. Humanity must return to an ideal-spiritual understanding of the world. It will achieve this through the discovery of spiritual America, and it will discover this when the path is found out in the world, which we have already symbolized in our building.

We have had to point out the progressive direction of our building by going from column to column, from architrave motif to architrave motif. This was the progression on the physical plane. But we must add that there is also an upward gaze, that we can also follow the motifs from bottom to top, that we can look up.

That which emerges on the physical plane in historical development—insofar as we can observe historical development externally—represents, as it were, progress. But it will become increasingly necessary for human beings to deepen themselves, to deepen their souls, which at the same time – as in Goethe's Faust, who descends to the mothers – is a real elevation into the spiritual world. This deepening of the soul is, of course, at the same time the elevation into the spiritual worlds, which is brought about by the good spirits.

But then, when human beings ascend into the spiritual worlds, there will be a sense of completion. Conclusion, I say. Let us really understand the word as I have said it. For when people talk about development today, they actually have a thought that seems like a barrel that one begins to roll, and it rolls and rolls and rolls, whereby one also imagines that it never actually began to roll, but that it has always been rolling. When people talk about development today, they almost always think of it as if there were always development, as if everything were always developing further and further and further, and as if it had always been this way and that way. But that is not how it really is. It is only a bad habit, a misbehavior of our thinking, when we think of development in the past and future as unlimited. The earth is evolving, geographically, physically, and so is every people. But this will come to an end, a conclusion. When everything has been discovered, it will come to an end. Then we cannot say: Now we will continue to equip our ships and discover more. That is not possible. It is not true that evolution can continue indefinitely; evolution has a conclusion. And just as physical evolution must have a conclusion, so too must spiritual evolution have a conclusion. One day, a dome will truly rise above what humanity has experienced historically. And just as it is true that no more ships can be equipped to discover even more distant lands on Earth once the entire globe has been discovered, it is also true that what can be discovered spiritually by human beings will indeed be discovered one day. It would be a completely false conception of evolution to say: humans have already discovered so much, researched so much, they will continue to research further and further, endlessly, and always discover new things. That would be the worst conception one could indulge in. However, one must think realistically if one wants to arrive at good conceptions. But very few people today think realistically: they believe they are thinking realistically, but they are not. For example, one encounters people today who say: Yes, if there is nothing left to explore, then the world will be quite boring, because that is what makes the world interesting in the first place, that one cannot imagine that exploration will ever come to an end. But it will come to an end, just as geographical exploration of the earth will come to an end. For those people who suffer torment at the thought that humans will one day have nothing left to explore, and who therefore ask: What will humans do then? - To these people it must be said: They will simply do something other than research; that will become apparent.

Now I have presented you with a series of ideas, the purpose and goal of which you may question. But if you hold these ideas together, you will be able to recognize this goal for yourselves. We see, as it were, how the whole of human history unfolds, just as our building rises and arches: People walk through the turning points of time as one walks from column to column; they rise as one looks up at the capitals and architraves, and they hope for a conclusion, just as one finds a conclusion when one looks up at the interior of the dome.

But there must be a conclusion; just as there will be such a conclusion in history, so too must there be a conclusion in the painting of our dome. This painting should not merely cover the surface, but should evoke the idea: When you raise your gaze to the painting on the dome surfaces, you will find nothing [physical] there. One should forget the physicality of what is painted there. The painting should be transparent; one must see through what is painted [on the surfaces] into the vastness of the spiritual.

Perhaps this will not yet be possible with our building, but in the further development of the principle of our building, it will one day be achieved by humanity. The humanity of the future will one day see what it has gained from spiritual science as a mighty dome, but as a dome whose configuration points out into the infinity of spiritual life.

Yes, my dear friends, when we live in one place on earth and want to go to another place and cannot do so at certain times, we experience that people are hostile towards each other, that they argue about earthly things and do even more than argue. One cannot argue about the sun and the stars. Even though the Chinese called their ruler the “Son of the Sun,” the “Son of Heaven,” and even though they started many wars with the people on earth, they never started a war over the possession of the sun; it never occurred to them to dispute the possession of the sun with other peoples. All kinds of things can cause the human souls of the peoples scattered across the earth to quarrel and fight. But nothing that draws people's gaze upward to the spiritual worlds can cause quarrels and fights. That can never lead to quarrels and fights.

We must be clear, however, that much still needs to happen in the course of Earth's development before humanity will be ready to look into the spiritual world through spiritual science. What spiritual science provides should be like the sun and stars in physical life. But many things will still be necessary for this to happen. Above all, it will be necessary for spiritual science to enable people to begin thinking not only with the instrument that is mostly used for thinking today, that is, not only with the head. In a certain sense, one can say that nothing is more foreign to us than our head. Truly, nothing is more foreign to us than our head! For this head, in terms of its main structure, was essentially already complete for human beings at the time of the ancient solar evolution. The rest is inherited — partly from the Saturn evolution — and then developed further, gaining another important influence during the Moon evolution. But what is thought in the head is, in essence, as foreign to human beings as the Saturn, Sun, and Moon evolutions are still foreign to their knowledge today.

And even though many sayings that exist in everyday life often contain profound truths, there is one thing you must never believe, even if it exists as such a saying: it is often claimed that every human being has their own head. That is wrong. No human being has their own head; everyone has the head of the cosmos! If someone were to say that they have their own heart, they would be saying something meaningful. But it is nonsense to say, “I have my own head.”

People will have to begin to develop thoughts that are experiences, as I described yesterday with the inner experience of getting up. We actually only experience getting up with our heads. We experience it in a very abstract way, that colossal thing that happens to us when we move from a lying position, in which we are, so to speak, parallel to the surface of the earth, in the direction of the earth's radius. This change, this assumption of direction, as it were, from the crossbeam of the cross to the vertical beam, when we really experience this, we experience something truly colossal, we experience something cosmic: the cosmic cross.

We experience it every day, but we do not think about it every day, that this cross is inscribed in human life as soon as it comes into motion, through the fact that human beings stand up and lie down.

But human beings are far, far removed from this abstract standing up and lying down, from this taking on the shape of the cross, to the idea that can be expressed in words: if human beings were not arranged on earth in such a way that they lie down and stand up again, then the mystery of Golgotha would not have been necessary in the development of the earth.

When someone pronounces the sound “B” or makes the sign for “B,” it means the sound “B.” When someone asks for a character on Earth that expresses the fact that the mystery of Golgotha was necessary for Earth's development, it is the sign of the cross that summarizes the lying down and standing up of human beings. Because human beings lie and stand on earth, they are such beings that the Mystery of Golgotha had to take place.

When we begin to think with the second brain — not with the head brain, but with the second brain, which I characterized in the lectures on “Occult Reading and Occult Hearing” by saying: We must regard the lobes of our brain as if they were fixed arms, as if our arms and hands were attached to them, and so on — then you will think that there can be no doubt that this sign of the cross is the expression of the mystery of Golgotha. Only for the head brain is such thinking not really possible today. But it is also the head brain that causes the basis for the many misunderstandings in the world. So many misunderstandings arise because today only the head brain is creative. But the second brain must also become creative, creative to the degree that something is fulfilled in the world that can be described in a certain sense with the image I mentioned earlier. I said that the Greeks did not know America. But if we go back to other documents, we find that there were times when America was known. It is just that knowledge of America has been lost again. Likewise, there have also been times when what spiritual science now wants to bring back down again was known. We also know from spiritual science that much of what people previously had in their dreams from subconscious experiences must consciously return. People really did have something like a common language, which only later became differentiated. The legend of the Tower of Babel contained in the Bible has something deeply grounded in it. But as long as people think only with their heads, they will not be able to think creatively; they will not be able to be creative as in ancient times, for example, in relation to language. But spiritual science has within it the capacity to set the linguistic elements in creative motion. And when I said in relation to building that the artistic has been set in motion in building, it must also be said that life itself must be set in motion.

And we can envisage a time when spiritual science will be creative, when language will become creative through what we think and imagine in spiritual science. Just as it is true that spiritual science will one day be spread throughout the world, so it is true that it will produce a common language that does not correspond to any of the present languages. Not even to Volapük or Esperanto, for these languages have arisen externally, inorganically. The language of the future, however, will arise from the fact that human beings will learn to live in sound, just as they can learn to live in color.

When they learn to live in sound, then sound will give birth to configuration, so that human beings will regain the ability to create a language out of spiritual experience. While we are still in the early stages of spiritual science in many respects, we have not even begun to address the latter point. But we must remember this in order to feel the full importance and essence of spiritual science in our souls, to feel that spiritual science carries within it a new knowledge, a new art, and even a new language, a language that will not be made, but will be born.

Just as people will never argue about the sun and the stars, so they will not argue about that language, alongside which the other languages can continue to exist quite well, and which will still be around when this new language has come into being.

As you will feel, we have set a broad ideal before our souls, a very broad ideal. And most of today's materialistic thinkers would certainly say of what has now been said: This is pure fantasy, for the fool who has been able to speak of creativity in relation to language and of what has been said in relation to spiritual science must have lost all firm ground beneath his feet.

One could well imagine that if someone who is so in tune with our times had been listening from some corner, he would have burst out laughing at the idea of losing oneself in the clouds and losing the ground beneath one's feet. But we could look at this person with understanding, because by setting such high ideals today, we have truly lost the ground beneath our feet. As long as the earth continues its evolution as a physical world body, this ideal will not come to pass. The earth will perish before this ideal is realized. But human souls will survive to other planetary incarnations and will experience the realization of the ideal when they become aware of it in our time.

Yes, Ahriman could stand there and act as referee between us and the one who is listening and laughing in the corner because he thinks we have lost our footing. Ahriman could rub his hands together and say: They call them ideals for the future; they have lost their footing, the man over there says so; he mocks himself and does not know how; he speaks the truth and does not know it.

But we know that even if we do not stand on the firm ground of the earth, we still stand in reality with what we make the most living words of our soul. And why? Because we profess our belief in the mystery of Golgotha seriously and not with the frivolity that is so common today. We know that Christ lives and that we can know what is right if we let him be the great teacher and guide in relation to our spiritual wisdom.

But he has spoken a word that says: You can only profess your faith in me in your innermost being if you profess not only in an outward sense to those words and ideals that will perish with the earth — the whole outer configuration of the earth will perish, but it will no longer be as it is now — but if you listen to my words. He himself said of these words: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” Therefore, my dear friends, we can be firm in our souls, even if we profess ideals that our opponents say no longer stand on solid ground. If we want to profess the mystery of Golgotha, then we must profess those ideals that are more lasting than the earth and the entire configuration of the stars that circle around the earth in the cosmos. Then we must listen to the revelations of the mystery of Golgotha, which will remain even when the earth no longer exists, and even the heavens that now look down upon the earth.

Deep, deep is the meaning of the words that emanate from the mystery of Golgotha. And he who does not want to rise from the earth into the dome, which should be transparent so that we can see into the spiritual world, does not live in reality. For if this dome is to be the expression of the mystery of Golgotha in architecture, then it must say something to us that can remind us of the words:

Heaven and earth will pass away,
but my words will not pass away.

Discussion of the carving work on the architrave motifs of the large dome

(stenographic notes by Rudolf Hahn)

We have added a piece of base at the bottom of the spaces between the first and second and the second and third columns. And it is only from the vertical of the base that the curve continues into the vault. Between the third and fourth columns, the motif merges directly into the vault; this remains the case for all the spaces between the columns. It begins at the second and third columns. We would have to carve out the part of the vault that is vertical between the first and second pillars. It is absolutely necessary that we try to carve out this tip, which has come out too easily.

Now I would like to ask you to focus your attention on something that is very important. If you look at the model, you will find a kind of drop hanging from top to bottom. You will find it if you follow the left side of the second column upwards. If you follow the drop on the model, you will find that this drop starts up there and leans over like this. This peculiar leaning has not yet come out: the drop hangs incorrectly, completely vertically. Of course, I don't need to mention that the individual motifs first have to be worked into each other.

If we look at the second column and go up along the right-hand side of the second column, we have a motif that is deflected as the innermost motif from the motif between the second and third columns, and which ends in a head bending downwards and to the right. This motif will cause us some pain when we reach the top, because in this motif we still see a depression in the middle of the model, an indentation working its way in. Then we have to look at the left and right heads. The left head must be worked in so that it tapers off very gently; it needs to be a little slimmer. Between the left head, which slopes down to the left, and the right head, when you look at the motif, you find that it has a certain slenderness, so that it must not transition from left to right across the base as it does now, but must be worked in. Surfaces must be such that one has the feeling that they dip concavely into the base, whereas now they dip convexly.

Then we must pay particular attention to one thing when we take this motif, which extends across the background. Take the arm—the one starting from the left between the third and fourth columns—which extends like a snake to the middle of the second column; when we study this motif in the model, we find that the entire line of this motif is not correct. In the model, it only reaches slightly upwards; the highest point must be clearly below this point for the aspect. And then we must ensure that this point becomes the leftmost point; as the model shows, it must not lie below this point. So when you go up between the second and third columns, where this snake motif arches highest, there is a point that is too high; the entire motif must be given the correct direction by removing the upper surface.

A motif that is composed above the columns – it is just above the edge of the third column – this motif, which has developed under the indentation and bulge motif, if you take it as it should be according to the model. Here it has a really awkward width; in the model it has a certain slenderness, especially in the lower section. This means that it tapers much more slenderly towards the top, is much more discreet than up there in its terrible awkward width. The bulkiness must be removed by cutting away the edge. Then we get the necessary perfect slenderness that must come out.

If you now go from this long, drawn-out snake motif to what is to the right of it, which then crosses over, winding its way to the lower motif: in the model there is a double curve, which I would characterize as follows: first it goes up like this and turns slightly, then it overturns and curves here, it bends over the snake motif. Something else must come out. If you first look at the motif between the third and fourth columns, and if you follow this motif, which begins to the right of the dome motif and curves over to unite with it, you will see that it has a peculiar way of going into itself; I ask you to study this particularly on the model. It dips down here, so that it really submerges into itself and emerges on the right: this motif is also understood when we compare it with the motif just shown, which crosses over to the motif on the left. These two motifs correspond to each other; one can only study these motifs properly if one is clear that such motifs, which seem to collide in space, have similar configurations. What follows the snake motif up to the bulge above the first snake must be viewed as follows: then you will find that in these coils that are there, the motif is inside, leaning directly to the right. Study the connections between the motifs everywhere.

We will still have a lot to do if we want to fully understand this subtle transition in the sequence of the bulge, which is still quite unnatural here. You can see it transitioning slowly and gradually.

Something, I would like to say, where you already have the feeling that a lot has been achieved . . . something is in the motif that begins here, crosses over to the left between the fourth and fifth columns, and overlaps there. This motif, even seen from down here, is already extremely well done; perhaps it needs the least work. What still needs to be done in this place is in the motif below, which of course must be completely in harmony.

Between the fourth and fifth columns, you have what is below, which transitions directly into the vault. If you take the left section, this left section lacks the protrusion that gives the whole thing its distinctive character. There must be a distinctive protrusion in it. Where it connects to the snake, it forms – as if it were bending downwards – a kind of head in this motif through the impact. This is missing here, although there is a curvature that runs peculiarly into itself, so that I would say: it runs backwards and upwards at the same time, which is something to note in general where the surfaces run in two directions at the same time. In the right-hand part of the same motif, what transitions over the vault must be raised even higher so that the elevation is clearly visible.

I have only one more thing to say: a tiny bit should be removed from the rightmost part of the much-praised motif, which can be clearly seen on the model.

Now I ask you to focus your attention on the space in the architrave between the fifth and sixth columns, from the left. You will notice that the adaptation of the lowest motif, which merges into the vault, and the one above it, which is the highest, is good; what lies in between brings out the style of the motif, which moves toward the small space—this powerful upward reach—which does not bring out the middle motif. This still needs to be worked in; this reaching out, both upwards and forwards, must be incorporated.

Then, following the motif, there are two drop motifs above the penultimate column. Particular attention must be paid to the character of the space between the two. If you study the character on the model, you will find that it must go deep into it, it must still be worked into it. But there is also a difference, a significant difference between the left drop (counting from here) and the right one. The right drop has a strong projection. Here it is again completely vertical and has a strong projection in its lower part; towards the end, it should not be so vertical if it is to have a projection, because this projection is an essential part of its character.

Take a look at the top curve between the last two columns. If you study this on the model, you will find that it has this peculiarity: if I were to make it in cross-section, I would make it so that it goes in and reaches over even more lovingly. It still needs to be worked into the base. If you look closely here, if you look up here, you cannot see between the second and third motifs, which can only be achieved when the lowest surface of the uppermost motif, i.e., not the bead motif, is worked in so that it goes deeper in.

Here, the second motif still covers the first too much. This is important to note because very little has been done yet. The most characteristic feature of the two drops above the very last column is the peculiar slenderness of the right one; it has already come out a little. But then the left one, which is the last one, immediately followed by the gate motif, must be carefully studied. It now really has this double-arched character, both downwards and upwards, outwards and across. That can also be done; there is enough wood there.

The gate motif itself just needs to be flattened a little, because otherwise it is fine. It has been brought out with a certain amount of care; it just needs to be flattened.

I must also mention this: if you go back to the intrusive, brash, corpulent motif, you will come, going to the left, towards the stage, to the motif between the second and third pillars, counting from the left, which has not yet been fully executed. There you have to study the peculiar curves that lie within it. If you study them in the model, you will see that one comes out here and another goes in here. That hasn't come out at all. It should come out straight, with this snake bending twice, bending downwards and upwards in the space between the second and third columns. What lies beneath has very peculiar twists and turns.

One must always pay attention to several things in these matters. One must pay attention to the lowest motif, which merges into the vault, one must pay attention to the snake, which gives this motif its form. Because this snake is actually directed towards the small or domed space, all these curves emerge. It is precisely this peculiar arching out that occurs between the second and third columns.

If we look to the left, we also see this deep furrow between the very first motif, which transitions into the gate motif; we see that this head does not actually protrude; it must be carved out, and the drop at the top must be much slimmer. In general, it is now apparent that we have strangely corpulent structures. Here on the model, it is clear to see that the drop must be much slimmer. What extends beyond the drop must connect; one must correspond to the other. You can see clearly on the model how the drop is completely protected and how the tip is really indicated in the indentation that this tip causes in the surface. In general, we must adhere to this: hollow forms are obtained in these things by studying the adjacent raised forms. By studying how the raised forms in the vicinity cause the hollow forms in the vicinity, one sees how one merges into the other. One surface acts on the other, is the counterpart of the other; this must be expressed on a large scale. This is the peculiarity that you can clearly perceive in these first columns on the right, which make up the progression from west to east. It is still strongly noticeable in the style of the three architraves that merge into the vault, here it becomes weaker, here it visibly comes to a halt. And here in the middle, the stage space pushes out again, you can feel the power coming from the east; it is most pronounced where the battle scene is really pronounced. If you take the Mercury motif on the architraves and on the columns, you have the battle site. This is where the development, the backwardness, the age of the hierarchies is expressed.

It has a very deep meaning that the snake motif is not above the Mercury column, that the snake motif is shifted completely to the side. When I noticed this, about eight or fourteen days after I had done it, I was really extremely surprised at how things really do come out right from the spiritual worlds, even where it is not consciously intended. Of course, if I had worked according to abstract laws, the serpent motif would not be here, but above the Mercury column. But just as those who remain behind stay behind the advancing beings, so the serpent motif must remain behind the Mercury column here.

I was extremely surprised at how art corresponds to occultism. Eight days after I had made it, I discovered that it had turned out that way and that it had to be that way.

With that, we have worked through the principles of what we need to work out. It is necessary, of course, that we work without pedantry.

The characteristic feature is that the building has an axis of symmetry and thus corresponds to an organism. Otherwise, you will not find it easily, because the motifs are arranged without repetition along this axis of symmetry. One must work internally in the etheric body, must experience the intentions while working, especially when asymmetrical forms are present. This is part of the motifs. One must work one's way into the artistic will down to the tips of one's fingers, toes, and nose; one must feel the artistic down to one's earlobes.

The numbers on the side refer to Figure 8, Architrave model of the large dome. They have been inserted by the editors and are intended as an aid to understanding and are not binding.