89. Knowledge of the Body and Knowledge of the Spirit

The general education of the present time has brought the knowledge of the body to a high level – the knowledge of the spiritual has not progressed equally. However, if this unconscious does not penetrate into consciousness, then all human life remains an illusion.

But it does enter: 1.) In the free concept, which is a spiritual one – to which nothing else corresponds but itself – if it could not actualize itself, then nothing would actualize it.

2.) In sense perception, for which I have nothing within me; if I could not experience the external world through myself, I would have no experience at all. Therefore, the judgment can only be experienced, not proven. But therefore, there is also no sharp boundary between feeling and will for the inner self (Brentano) – the judgment simply connects the body to the external world; the will connects it to the spiritual world.

The soul experiences in the imagination what it has become; in the will, what it is to become. I can only imagine what I can imagine by virtue of my body; I will what the spirit predisposes in me. The will that works in the imagination is soul; the imagination that works in the will is soul; that will is corporeal; this imagination is spiritual.

The body is will-bearing matter. The soul is the spirit that acts upon perception.

Actual perception arises when unconscious matter meets with corporeal matter in sensory perception. Actual will arises when the conscious soul meets with the spirit that acts upon perception in the voluntary decision.

In the very general concept, the body immediately reveals a spiritual aspect.

In the material process, which corresponds to a volitional impulse, the spirit immediately reveals itself materially.

No matter how much one may resist it, the mathematical judgments are revelations of the substance. And likewise, the chemical processes of the organism are spiritual: in mathematics, the substance is so spiritual that we no longer notice it. In digestion, the spirit is so material that we no longer notice it either.

In ordinary feeling, the imagination and the will meet in such a way that they harmonize.

In pain, the imagination cannot find a will equal to it. In pleasure (joy), the imagination lags behind the will.

Pessimism arises from a lack of imagination. Optimism is a sign of a wealth of imagination. The average thinker discusses pessimism. The humanities scholar takes it as a sign of a lack of imagination. And he finds that pessimism is rooted in a body that is not sufficiently spiritually active. He regards optimism as a sign of a body that is so well formed that it reflects the will. —

Does man really perceive nothing spiritual? Or has he been educated only to forbid himself to recognize the spiritual? —

Whether the spirit in the universe also works directly materially?

Whether the material directly reveals itself spiritually?

That is, whether man can will something that is not merely earthly? “My kingdom is not of this world”.

Whether the spirit accomplishes something that shows the extraterrestrial? “I and the Father are one”.

Many religions - could the “second coming” reconcile them? If it became clear to others that the Christ is just as universally human as the sun. — The Jesus mystery would have to be individual, the Christ mystery could then become universal. Detachment of the Christ from a particular religious form. Seeing the essential in a spiritual event. Not to convert, but to share. — The peoples who have embraced Christianity needed it as a counterweight to their materialism. Those who have not accepted it have not needed it – those who are of the earth will not understand each other; those who are of the sky will. “What is the Christ to us? The same one from whom you have your religion. To you he gave it from the extraterrestrial. To us in the earthly. He revealed himself to you as Father, to us as Son. If they are one, then we are one.” The heresy of filioque.