20. On the Highest Form of Knowledge

I was never able to describe the sum of ideas through which I sought to get closer to the universe and its creatures with one of the common expressions such as idealism, realism, Spinozism, pantheism, theism, etc., because I could not admit that the overfull inner life of nature could be measured by one-sided definitions. I did not want to see nature harnessed to abstractions, but to wait and listen until it spoke to me and revealed its secret to me in the form that was appropriate to it.

In the highest form of knowledge, all predetermined methods must give way because nature does not want to be determined by the way in which it reaches us. In any case, however, in that higher listening, space and time cease to play a role; these two lead man astray the longest. For even if we succeed in detaching from the other sensory properties of things and penetrating deeper into their essence, space and time still seem inseparable from things. But anyone who has not made this separation can never come to higher insights. For it is only through ideas that space and time acquire a true meaning. The idea allows everything extended to grow out of its spiritual womb; without idea, a perception of space is impossible. But it is inadmissible to think of the idea itself as temporal/spatial; the idea is a non-spatial and non-temporal, and therefore eternal, reality. So I can very well call my view of things idealism, because I am always trying to grasp the ideas that are only accessible to intuitive, time- and spaceless vision. When I grasp the idea, I feel as if I had immersed myself in the world spirit. A higher life in the world speaks to me. But it does not speak to everyone in this way; those who have not ceased to perceive only with the outer senses and to process only this perceptual material with the mind cannot hear that voice of nature. There is a higher sensuality to which we must first educate ourselves. There is a personality that first comes into being in us and suddenly shows us everything in a new light. We then cease to live in a particular place and at any given time. We live the higher infinite being. But we also cease to be an individual because we are one with the universal spirit. Thus, by working our way up to the highest level of individuality, we transcend it and perceive as with the senses of the world soul. Of course, we do not achieve this through abstract studies or logical rules, but only through constant inner perfection. “Know thyself” is a saying that I have always distrusted. I do not want to know myself, at least not as a finished product; because every dead point in my soul blocks the way for me to open the gates of the universe. As long as I merely recognize myself, I am not willing to approach the higher state of being. I must recreate myself to become perfect; to recognize is to live within nature: we must co-create spiritually if we want to recognize in the higher sense. The metamorphosis is intended to be an example of this. Those who cling to the externals of life and are atomistically minded cannot understand it. In the higher sense, there is nothing in nature that is separate; the divine spark of the infinite lives in everything, and for those who have not seen a thing in its light, it does not exist. You can apply all your efforts to something; if you have not awakened within yourself the gift of listening to that word, through which our intuition suddenly opens up to the inner essence and everything becomes bright, then all knowledge is dead. People believe that they recognize what they only understand; they believe that they understand what they only know.