Human History and the World Views of Civilized Nations

GA 353 — 20 May 1924, Dornach

Decadent Atlantic Culture in Tibet – The Dalai Lama How can Europe spread its spiritual culture in Asia? – Englishmen and Germans as colonizers

Good morning, gentlemen! Perhaps someone has also thought of something for today's hour?

Question: How are we to understand the miracles related in the Bible about Moses – the stilling of the sea?

Dr. Steiner: You see, that was based not so much on a sudden miracle as on the fact that Moses was very knowledgeable. He was not just what he is portrayed as in the Bible, but he was actually a student of the Egyptian high schools, the mysteries. And in these schools they taught not only about the spiritual world, but also about the natural world from a certain point of view. Now in the sea there is the time of the ebb and the flow, of such a rising and then again going back, and the thing was just this, that Moses knew how to organize the crossing over the Red Sea so that he went over with his people at a time when the sea had gone back and a sandbank, which had become visible as a result, that is, had been laid bare, could be used to go over. So the miracle is not that Moses dammed up the Red Sea and fought it, but that he actually knew more than the others, that he could choose the time in the right way. The others did not know that. Moses had calculated the matter so that he arrived at just the right time - he knew that it took so long, or rather that it had to go quickly so that one would not be surprised by the sea again. Of course, all of this seemed like a miracle to the others. In these things, one must always make sure that knowledge actually underlies the things, not some other things, but knowledge.

This is the case with most things reported from ancient times. The people were amazed because they did not understand the matter, did not know. But then, when you know that there were very clever people in ancient times too, then you can explain things. Otherwise, there is not much to explain about these things.

Perhaps someone has a question?

Question: Can the spiritual culture that flows from Tibet into the rest of Asia still satisfy these people, or does it fall entirely into decadence?

Dr. Steiner: Well, you see, Tibetan culture is a very old culture, and it is a culture that actually comes from the ancient Atlantic period. You just have to imagine that there was a time when most of Europe was under water, and the water only receded towards Asia. In contrast, there was land where the Atlantic Ocean is today. Where we cross over to America between Europe and America today, there was land. So that was an ancient time when the ratio of land and water was quite different from what it is today.

But now, in the time that lies five, six, seven thousand years back, the same culture was in Asia as on this Atlantic continent, which was thus in the place that is now covered by the sea between Europe and America. Over there in Asia, there was a culture in those days that has been preserved in the clefts, in the subterranean caves of Tibet. This Atlantic culture was, of course, completely submerged when the sea came between Europe and America and Europe rose up; but in Tibet, over there, it was preserved. But now this culture was actually only suitable for those ancient times, where people lived under completely different conditions than today. You just have to imagine that in those days the air was not the same as it is today, that people were not as heavy as they are today, but that people had a much lower weight, that the air was much denser. Actually, in those days the air was always interspersed with a thick fog, which made it possible to live in a completely different way.

Now, writing and reading or anything like that didn't exist back then, but people had signs. These signs were not put on paper. Paper didn't exist. But they weren't put on parchment either; they were scratched into rocks. These rocks had been hollowed out by people, and into the interior of these caves they then scratched, as it were, their secrets; so that one must actually understand the signs they made if one wants to know what these people imagined.

Now you may ask: Why did these people keep it so secret? Yes, you know, the oldest architecture was not at all about building on the outside, but rather digging into the rocks and making dwellings in the rock. So that is the oldest form of architecture. It is not surprising that the oldest form of architecture in Tibet is the same. But such a culture gradually comes to decadence and decline. And what was later created in Tibet is such that it is no longer really useful in the present day, because Tibetan culture is older than Indian culture. Indian culture only emerged after the earth had taken on the form it has today. Tibetan culture is therefore very old. And this Tibetan culture has preserved in a poor form what was previously present in a relatively good form. Thus, the principle of rule in particular has been developed in Tibet in a rather unpleasant form. In Tibet, the one who is to be the ruler actually enjoys divine worship; and this divine worship is basically already prepared. One actually chooses there, I would say, in a transcendental way. The Dalai Lama, who is thus chosen as ruler, comes about in such a way that long before, when the old Dalai Lama is still there and one realizes: Now, this old Dalai Lama may soon die -, a family is determined somewhere, and one says: The new Dalai Lama must come from this family. - That was the case in Tibet in earlier times. It was not a hereditary rule. That was not the case, but a priesthood that actually rules in reality determines a new family from which a Dalai Lama should emerge.

Now, if a child was born into this family, it was kept until the old Dalai Lama died. You can imagine that the greatest mischief was done with this. If the old Dalai Lama no longer suited someone, they simply looked for a child and said: “The soul of the old Dalai Lama must now enter this soul.” But first he had to die. The priesthood took care of that at the right time, and then, for the sake of the people's faith, the soul of the old Dalai Lama entered the child. In this way the people have driven it to the fact that actually the whole nation believed: the same soul that is in any Dalai Lama was already in the Dalai Lama many thousands of years ago. It is always the same soul, they thought. Actually, for the people it has always been the same Dalai Lama; he has only changed the outer body.

It was not like that in the old culture that was there before; but that is quite extraordinary nonsense that has arisen. However, you can see from this that it has gradually become more important for the priesthood to do things in such a way that their rule was secured.

However, this does not prevent us from discovering great scientific secrets that people in ancient times once had, despite the fact that if we manage to decipher these signs that are engraved on the rocks, but to which Europeans have only rarely had access, the priesthood has gradually come to see that it was important to conduct things in such a way as to ensure their rule.

So it is true that one comes across great scientific secrets that people in ancient times had, and it would only be a matter of this knowledge being found in a new form.

Now it is like this: the same knowledge that was once there, that came to people as if in a dream fog, this same knowledge is to come to people again through anthroposophy. But that cannot happen in the Orient. You see, in the Orient a new knowledge, a new realization, will never come about in the same way as here in Europe, because the Oriental body is not suited to it. The experiments that have to be carried out to achieve the things I have just told you about can only be done in the West, not in the East. But the Oriental is conservative to a degree that the European can hardly imagine. He does not want anything new, and so of course what we are doing here in Europe makes no particular impression on him. If, on the other hand, you can tell him that significant wisdom comes to light from the old crypts, as these rock caves are called, and that is old, then it makes a very powerful impression on him. The Europeans also have a little of this: you only have to look at the higher degrees of the Masonic lodges when you enter them! As for Anthroposophy, well, they are a little interested in that because they are also concerned with supersensible things; but they do not go into it very deeply. If, on the other hand, you tell them: This has been found, this was an ancient Egyptian wisdom or an ancient Hebrew wisdom, they are delighted! They go into it right away, because human beings are such that what is newly found does not make a real impression on them; on the other hand, what is ancient, even if it is not understood, is what makes a very considerable impression on people. Therefore, one can assume that it is quite possible, because it is a matter of ancient wisdom that can be found in Tibet, that it can be used to achieve a certain revival. Because many things have also been lost to the Asians, because the most important Asian culture, Indian culture, was only established later. So much of what Asians do not know could be found in Tibet. Now, the people there do not really have the opportunity to spread the word properly, because the old Tibetan priesthood did nothing to spread it; they just wanted to keep the old rule for themselves. Knowledge is power when it is kept secret. And when the Europeans came to Tibet, they did not understand the things. So there is not much prospect that the real Tibetan truths can be spread; they live on in old traditions. Because the thing is still so that much has just come down to posterity, and that one can already have an idea of what is actually hidden there. But it is difficult to imagine any actual dissemination. The matter is decadent, as you say in the question; but if one goes back to what is written in the crypts, and not to what the priesthood says, then one will be able to get hold of something extraordinary. It will just be extraordinarily difficult to decipher it. Without anthroposophy it is difficult to find. Anthroposophy can decipher it, but does not need to, because it finds the thing itself.

Question: How could Europe do something to turn around such a downward trend in Asia?

Dr. Steiner: That is a very good question! You see, if Europe does not do something, then the world will have to go downhill! Because in Asia, as can be seen from the words I have just said, people hold on to the old, but do not know any progress. You can see that in China. China is at the same stage as it was thousands of years ago. The Chinese had many things thousands of years ago that were only discovered in Europe much later: paper, the art of printing, and so on, they already had there. But they do not accept progress, they keep it in the old form.

The Europeans, on the other hand, when they come to Asia, what do they do? The English brought the Chinese opium and such things in the first half of the 19th century! But the Europeans have actually done nothing right so far to spread any kind of real spiritual life in Asia. It's also difficult because people just don't accept it.

You see, that's where it's interesting: you know, there are also European missionaries; they go over there with European religion, European theology and want to spread European culture in Asia. Yes, that makes no impression on the Asians! Because then these missionaries describe a Christ Jesus to them as they imagine him. The Asian says: Yes, when I look at my Buddha, he has much more excellent qualities! - So that does not impress them at all. They would only be impressed if Jesus Christ were presented as he was here in these lectures some time ago, also in response to your questions. Then, of course, it would make an impression. But the Asian would still be conservative, reactionary, and initially mistrustful.

It is also very strange, gentlemen: You see, there are individual students of the old wisdom. These students in Asia have learned something from Tibetan scholars, sages, Tibetan initiates. The initiates themselves do not deal with the Europeans; but students have dealt with them after all. Yes, sometimes one is quite extraordinarily amazed. I have already told you many things that will have amazed you, such as the influence of the universe on man. If you really want to research that, it takes a very long time. I can truly say: Some of what I can tell you today took forty years before I could say it! Because you can't find it overnight, but you have to find it over the years. Now such things are found. For example, what I have told you about the moon, that it has a population that has to do with the population of the earth in that reproduction is regulated by it. Yes, gentlemen, you really don't find that on the paths that current science takes; nor do you find it overnight, but you do find it over the course of many years. It is so! Then you have it. Yes, but then, when you have it, suddenly a strange light dawns on you about what the students of the oriental initiates say. Before that, you don't understand it at all. People talk, let's say, of spirits of the moon and their influence on the earth. The European scholars say: That's all nonsense, what they say! But when you come to it yourself, you no longer say that it is nonsense, but you are just amazed at what these old minds knew many thousands of years ago, and what has been lost to humanity again! It is even a great impression that one can get: one researches these things oneself with tremendous effort, and then one comes to the conclusion that it has already been known before, and only in a way that is incomprehensible today, sometimes even not understood by those who say it, has come down from ancient times. So one can certainly have a certain respect, a great respect, a great esteem for what was once there.

Now, if the Europeans want to do something in Asia, it would be necessary for them to start by studying anthroposophy! Otherwise they will not be allowed to do anything there. Contemporary European science and technology do not impress the Asians, for they regard contemporary European science as childish, as something that only deals with outward appearances, and they have no need for outward European technology. They say, “Why should we slave at machines? That is inhumane!” They don't find it impressive at all, and they see it as an infringement of their rights when railways and factories are built over there; that's what the Europeans are doing. But they actually hate that over there. So you can't go about it that way either. You also have to learn something from the old days. And in the old days, people actually had a certain spirit for how to proceed.

Do you see why today's European culture should not be able to do something in Asia? After all, one person did manage to do something in Asia with Greek culture! That was in the 4th century BC, before the founding of Christianity: Alexander the Great succeeded. Alexander the Great did manage to bring much of Greek culture to Asia. That is now there inside. What Alexander brought to Asia has even come back to Europe in a roundabout way, through Spain, the Arabs and the Jews! But how did Alexander the Great manage to bring these things to Asia at all? Only by not proceeding as today's Europeans do. Europeans consider themselves the clever people, the absolutely clever people. When they go somewhere else, they say: they are all stupid; so we have to bring them our wisdom. Yes, but the others can't do anything with that. Alexander didn't do that; instead, he first entered into what the people had. He only very slowly, in a small way, let something of his flow into what the others had, appreciated and respected what the others had.

And that is the secret of all successful endeavor: to bring something to the situation. Despite all the things that can be said against the English, despite the fact that it is a sad chapter in English history, for example, that the English brought opium to China out of pure selfishness in order to make money from it, and despite all the other can be said against the English, one must still say this: not exactly in the intellectual realm, but even there – but especially in the economic realm, the English always know to respect what is customary among the peoples to whom they come. They simply know how to respect that! The Germans, for example, respect that the least. The Germans are therefore unhappy in all colonization because they do not even think about what it looks like for the people where they want to have their colonies. They are supposed to adopt what the Germans themselves have in the middle of Europe, head over heels! Of course that doesn't work. That is why it is the case that development has taken this path: England is happy to maintain its colonies, even when the colonists revolt and do all sorts of things – economically, England always retains the upper hand. So the English do understand how to respond to the nature and character of foreign peoples. The English also wage war quite differently from the way the Germans wage war, for example. How does a German imagine waging war against a people? I do not want to speak out against war, but just tell how the Germans imagine it: Well, you just have to go and defeat this nation. The English do not do that, but they watch first, rather they stir up another nation and let them smash each other, and they watch as long as it possibly can, that is, they let the people finish each other. That is how history has always been. That is precisely how this English empire was founded. The others, don't they, never really know which way the wind is blowing. The English have a certain instinct for respecting the peculiarities of foreign peoples. That is why the English have succeeded in achieving such colossal economic superiority. In England, it would certainly never have occurred to anyone to do what has now been done in Germany, namely to introduce the Rentenmark. Of course, there is now a huge shortage of money in Germany. Nobody has any money. But when the Rentenmarks were issued – the so-called stable-value money – people saw it as something terribly clever! Of course, it was the stupidest thing that could have been done. Because as long as every paper money in England is covered by gold, there is no way around it, economically, than to do the same all over the world: to have gold backing for every paper money. If you create money for which there is no gold backing, then this money must either immediately decrease in value, that is, the exchange rate must fall, or if you do it artificially, as you are doing now with the stable-value money, then the goods will become all the more expensive. Isn't that right, now you have a Rentenmark in Germany; it is always worth a Mark. Yes, but, gentlemen, you only get as much as you used to get for fifteen pfennigs, so in reality it is still not worth more than fifteen pfennigs. That it does not fall, that it has “stable value”, that is just an illusion. And so it is: one thinks in Germany, but one has no sense of observing the realities.

You see, there is a very nice anecdote about how different nations study natural history, say, for example, of a kangaroo or some other animal that is in Africa. The Englishman goes to Africa – just as Darwin, in fact, in order to come to natural science, made his trip around the world – and looks at the animal where it really lives. There he can see how it lives, what its natural conditions are. The Frenchman takes this animal from the desert to the zoological garden. He studies it in the zoological garden; he does not observe the animal in its natural environment, but in the zoological garden. But what does the German do? He doesn't care about the animal at all, what it looks like, but he sits down in his study and starts thinking. He is not interested in the thing itself - according to Kantian philosophy, as I told you the other day - but only in what is in his head. Then he thinks about something long enough. And after thinking about it long enough, he says something. But that doesn't correspond to reality.

But this is only relative with regard to the English. For the way in which people in ancient times influenced people is no longer understood in Europe today - how Alexander the Great apparently left everything as it was and only very gradually and slowly did what he had to bring from Greece to Asia. This is no longer understood in Europe. But the Europeans would have to get used to it again. Therefore, the first thing the Europeans would have to learn is not just to carry over to Asia what they already have, but above all, the Europeans should learn very carefully what the Asians know; then they would know, for example, what Tibetan wisdom is. Then they would not tell people in the old way, but in the new way, but would use what Tibetan wisdom is. And then, if they respected the culture of others, they would achieve something with it. That is what Europe must learn right now. Europe is actually a large theoretical structure. Europe theorizes, but basically has no practice. It is true! Europe also does business in a theoretical way, just by thinking things up. That works for a while. It is not always possible in the long run. But Europe is particularly unhappy in the spread of spiritual culture because it does not understand how to engage with others. Here, too, spiritual science must bring about a change of heart. But how can that be done today? You see, gentlemen, the point of anthroposophy is to act in the spirit of a true practice of life. Well, you have to start somewhere. What have I done myself, gentlemen? I once wrote about Nietzsche - and people believed that I was now a follower of Nietzsche. If I had written as people would have wanted me to after some of my views, I would have written: Nietzsche is a great fool, Nietzsche has asserted this and that folly, one must fight Nietzsche to the death, and so on. I would have written a pamphlet against Nietzsche; I could have ranted almost as much as Nietzsche himself ranted, but it would have been of no use at all! I took up Nietzsche's teaching; I presented what Nietzsche himself said and only let Anthroposophy flow into it. Today people come and say: He used to be a Nietzschean, now he is an Anthroposophist. - Precisely because I am an Anthroposophist, it has been written about Nietzsche as it has been written by me! Then I wrote about Haeckel in the same way. Of course I could have written: Haeckel is a blatant materialist who understands nothing about the spirit and so on. Yes, gentlemen, in that case nothing would have been done; but I took Haeckel as he is, and did the same with everything. I did not deny the facts, but took things as they are. And so, at least through anthroposophy, we have a beginning of what we must do if we are to carry culture over to Asia! Above all, one would have to know exactly what the ancient Brahmins claimed and what the Buddhists claim. One would then have to present Buddhism and Brahmanism to the people, but also incorporate what one considers to be correct. This is how, for example, the disciples of Buddha himself did it. Shortly before the emergence of Christianity, Buddha's disciples spread Buddhism in Babylon, over by the Euphrates and Tigris, but in the way I have just described to you, by speaking to people in such a way that they could understand something. In ancient times, it was not at all a matter of pushing through theories just for the sake of being stubborn. The Asians do not understand European obstinacy at all. It is quite the case that, for example, the relationship between the Brahmins and the Buddhists is not the same as that between Catholics and Protestants. Today, Catholics and Protestants teach their doctrines in a purely theoretical way: one believes this, the other something else. There is hardly any other difference between the Brahmins and the Buddhists than that the Brahmins do not worship the Buddha and the Buddhists do. And so they actually get along with each other in a completely different way than Protestants and Catholics get along with each other in Europe.

It is now the case that you have to have a sense of reality if you want to spread culture! I would say that you can literally sweat blood when you see how Europeans are doing business in Asia today. In the process, everything that Asia has is destroyed, and nothing comes of it. Now, of course, the real misery is that Europe itself is in misery and that it is very difficult to imagine how Europe is to get out of this misery. The great misery of this is that Europe itself is now in decline, that Europe cannot really get out of all the cultural damage it is in unless people decide to embrace a real spiritual culture. Many still do not believe this today. And so it is the case today that all the people who have come to Europe from Asia, for example, have really found: These Europeans are actually all barbarians.

You have probably also heard that all sorts of Asians, cultured Asians, clever Asians, are wandering around Europe; but they all think that the Europeans are actually barbarians. And they have this opinion because so much of the old science of the spirit, of the old knowledge of the spirit, has been preserved in Asia that what the Europeans know seems childish to them. Everything that is so admired in Europe seems terribly childish to people in Asia!

You see, the Europeans have developed in such a way that even their great technical advances are actually all terribly young. For example, it is interesting that when you go to certain museums where there are remains from ancient European times, you can sometimes be terribly amazed. You can be amazed, for example, in Etruscan museums, where the remains of what was Etruscan culture are, a culture that once existed in Europe, at how skilled people were, for example, in dental treatment. They were already treating teeth quite skilfully, inserting a kind of filling, and that was made of stone! All this was lost in Europe, and a barbarism really did occur in Europe. By the time we speak of the migration of peoples – in the 3rd to 7th centuries AD – everything in Europe had actually been barbarized. And it was only after this time that things were conquered again. Of course, today we are terribly surprised at all the things that have been achieved! But they were already there once. Where did they come from back then? Back then they more or less came over from Asia! The Asians then also lost the external technology they had. The Chinese still have some of it. But in spiritual culture itself, the Asians are in fact still ahead of the Europeans today. And if we in Europe can't find anything better than what the Asians have in spiritual culture, why then should we have missions and the like in Asia at all? That is not necessary at all!

So the spread of culture in Asia only makes sense again when Europe itself has a spiritual science. If Europe can give Asians spiritual science, then perhaps the Asians will also accept that European technology be brought to them. But now, don't they just realize that the Europeans don't know anything except this technology. And it is precisely the case among Asians that it makes a great impression on them when, for example, they come to Germany - when a real Asian, who is educated, learned, comes to Germany today; it has been seen, for example, in well-educated Chinese scholars: when they come to Germany and they are told about Goethe and Schiller - they pay attention! The scholar says, “Yes, Goethe and Schiller were not as clever, not as wise as the old Asian personalities were, but still, there was something of spirituality.” But in the 19th century, all that quickly diminished, all that quickly disappeared. And today, the Chinese scholar sees in the German, for example, a terrible barbarian. He says, “With Goethe and Schiller, German culture has perished.” The fact that the railroad was invented in the 19th century does not impress him. He is still somewhat impressed by Goethe's Faust, but he still maintains that his great Asian personalities were much wiser. This is something that the European must realize first of all. He should realize that the Asian does not care about such concepts as the European has; he does not care about them at all, but the Asian wants images, like the images in the monasteries of Tibet. The Asian wants images. These abstractions, these concepts that the European has, the Asian does not want them, they hurt his brain, he does not want them.

And a symbol like the swastika, for example, the so-called swastika – this symbol was an ancient sun symbol – it was widespread throughout Asia. The old Asians still remember that. Certain Bolshevik government officials were clever enough to use this ancient swastika as their symbol, just like the German nationalists. This makes a much greater impression on the Asians than anything that Marxism is. Marxism consists of concepts for thinking; that does not impress people. But such a sign does impress people. And if you don't understand the people, if you don't engage with them, but come to them with something that is completely alien to them, then you will achieve absolutely nothing among them.

So it is that here too it is shown that in Europe everything depends on having spiritual knowledge, a spiritual science.

Perhaps you have also heard that a large two-volume book has been published by a certain Spengler – I have heard that he even gave a lecture in Basel once – a book by Oswald Spengler: 'The Decline of the West', that is, the decline of Europe and America. The man shows how everything that is now there in so-called European culture must perish. That is obvious. He regards it as sick, it must perish. Well, gentlemen, what is there today in external culture must also perish. Something new must be built from within, from the spirit. But the external must perish. That is why the book is about the decline of the West. You can hardly say anything against the book, against what he says about the decline of the West, about what is necessarily said in terms of outward appearances. But now the Spengler comes to what he regards positively, what presents itself to him as new. And what does he show, gentlemen? What is that in Oswald Spengler? That is Prussianism! So that all of Europe must adopt Prussianism; that must be the culture of Europe's future, Spengler believes.

Well, I don't know what he said in Basel, because I can't imagine that it would have made a big impression on the Swiss if he had shown that Prussianism must come out of this downfall! But you see that a very important person, a clever person, like Spengler, can very well see: yes, what is there must perish; but the future must be one of brutal force. He says this quite openly: in the future there can only be the brutal, powerful conqueror – that is what he means.

Now, if the most widely read book is one of the most widely read books in Germany is of course one of the most widely read books in Germany, that of Oswald Spengler - and the Oriental, the Asian, compares what is in it with his own intellectual culture, and has to say to himself: That is one of the smartest people in Europe! And then he considers his own highly developed spiritual science, albeit in a fantastic, ancient way, and says: Yes, what kind of people are these, these most intelligent people in Europe? They can't bring us anything!

Gentlemen, that is precisely the point. And when the question is raised: How could Europe do something against such a downward-going current of time in Asia? - yes, there one must simply say: It is so in Europe that the Europeans themselves must first come to themselves, must first achieve a spirituality that was lost with them during the migration of nations. In the first Christian centuries, a real spiritual culture was actually lost. Because what came to Europe was not really the deeper Christianity, but words. It was best seen in how Luther translated the Bible. What did he make of the Bible? An incomprehensible book! Because you cannot understand what Luther's Bible is if you are honest. You can believe it, but in reality it cannot be understood because in Europe the time had already come when people no longer knew anything about the spirit. There is spirit in the Bible! When translating the Bible, you have to translate it spiritually. But what the German Luther Bible contains, for example, is incomprehensible if you take it honestly. This is actually the case in all areas, with the exception of the very external knowledge of nature, but that does not really lead into the world at all. And if Europe wants to do something in Asia at all, I have to answer this question: It will only be able to do something when it has come to its senses.

Well, gentlemen, I now have to go on a trip to Paris; I will let you know when we will continue this matter.