The Nature of Man in the Light of Spiritual Science

GA 68d — 11 January 1908, Leipzig

16. Man, Woman and Child in the Light of Spiritual Science

Today I want to talk about how Theosophy can be directly applied to the art of living, how it can refine and purify our everyday feelings and thus be made useful. Theosophical concepts can be applied directly to life in the context of husband, wife and child. However, there is great diversity here, because they are not as simple as one might imagine.

All ages have grappled with the question: What does the child get from the parents, what is the relationship of the parents to the child, and what relationship to the new generation in general? In our time, the question of how parental traits are passed on to the child is of particular concern, and to what extent the parents' traits become a kind of destiny for the children. These questions also arise in art, for example in Ibsen's “Ghosts”, where the inheritance from the parents is carried out in such a terrible fate for the child. It is reminiscent of the fate in the Greek tragedies, only drawn into materialism. All this shows that this question has aroused a deep interest. Only he can form a judgment on it who regards the human being as a whole in its fourfold nature. Our time, after all, sees only the physical body. But the question must be considered in two ways: first, in what form the child's part is to be considered, and then, to what extent the parents are involved in what comes from the child.

The physical sciences have a word for this relationship: “inheritance”. They use it for humans and also for lower organisms, and apply it to humans quite mechanically. These sciences are unaware of a fact: that a great lawfulness runs through all levels of existence, but that these facts increase.

Inheritance is something completely different for humans than for lower creatures. If we draw comparisons with facts from the lower nature, we find two closely related concepts: the concepts of reproduction and love. Love already occurs in lower creatures and becomes more refined up to humans. I am not talking about the concept here, but about something real, such as electricity. It is a real force that passes through all people, only this love is in a completely different situation. When a lower creature reaches its peak and is ready to reproduce, love comes into it. We see that these lower creatures are exhausted afterwards and soon die. For them, death is the connection to and the consequence of love. It is no different with plants; after fertilization and after the germ for the next plant has been created, they die. But if we go up to higher living beings, we see that they preserve something beyond love. The plant preserves nothing, it dies; we also find this in lower animals; love brings them death. But a higher being preserves its individuality. This is most highly developed in humans. In this, man differs quite essentially from the animal closest to him.

There is a fact that characterizes the fundamental difference between man and all animals. Usually this is not recognized in the right light, nor in the right weight. The fact seems simple: man can be described by us as a single, individual being. This is of the same interest to us as when we describe an entire species in the animal. In the case of the lion, for example, we are not so much interested in its characteristics, but our interest remains with the species. You cannot write a biography of an animal; that makes it clear to you. Man, as a single human being, is a species in itself. The biography shows us very clearly what esoteric science teaches us: the necessity of re-embodiment. In animals, we simply find a similarity to our parents. But do we understand Schiller when we observe his parents? He may well have his nose, his walk, his posture, even his predisposition to illness from his parents, but we will never find in them what makes Schiller Schiller for humanity.

It used to be assumed that fish could develop in river mud. The first to break the mold was the Italian naturalist Redi. He almost fell prey to the Inquisition for claiming that living things must arise from living things. Today we take this for granted. But in the realm of the soul and spirit, the whole of science believes it. It does not ask in the case of Schiller, where do the soul qualities come from? Theosophy answers: through re-embodiment. Schiller's innermost being did not come from his ancestors, but from the figure in his previous life. Thus, we see in every human being what has its origins in an earlier life, and this sheds a proper light on the relationship between father, mother and child. The parents only provide the shell for this being to take on, which is basically its own offspring.

It is similar with the plant germ that is sunk into the earth. The idea, the thought, contains the whole form, but it would never have come into being without this mother earth; likewise, nothing comes into being unless the germ enters into it. A patch of earth provides the opportunity for plant germs to develop, but it is the earth that helps to determine whether it will become a bean plant or a pea plant. For higher spiritual science, it is similar with the higher self of man. After the time between birth and death, man lives in another world, in Devachan. There he remains until he is ripe for new embodiment. Then something must be given to him so that the power within him can become saturated with material, and so the germ from the spiritual world receives its covering through the parents. We can no longer say that parents pass on to the child what is insofar as the earth has only a certain part of the plant.

Now let us consider the four-fold nature of man, and what part each has. The newborn child undergoes a different kind of development of its individual parts. From birth to the change of teeth, the physical body takes on its form. It comes to an end with the child's own teeth; the first teeth are inherited. The form grows and expands, but it itself is determined. From the seventh year to sexual maturity, the etheric body develops. This forms the final point.

When a person reaches sexual maturity, he becomes capable of producing an equal being. The astral body develops from about the ages of 14 to 21. Just as all the properties of the physical body develop up to the age of seven, the properties of the astral body, all the instincts and feelings that lead the person into the future, develop during this time. It is a crime if during this time the rosiness of hope is neglected, the bliss of the astral body. By the age of twenty-two the I in man comes out. Thus every single part of the human being develops gradually.

What part of it comes from our previous life and what part is inherited from our parents? We can learn a great deal about this from the fact mentioned above. In the lower animals, because nothing remains behind at sexual maturity, nothing will remain from previous lives; they will die out; no individuality is present; they die when they love.

Now you will understand that something is basically inherited, something is anchored in the physical and etheric bodies, and that the astral body and the ego must lead back to the previous life. What can be similar to the physical form comes out up to the seventh year. Until sexual maturity, we recognize which qualities are inherited from the father and mother. At sexual maturity, things come out that come from previous lives. The more the being rescues itself after it has reached sexual maturity, the more is not inherited. Nevertheless, what was acquired earlier is already there before, as can be seen from the fact that predispositions show up in early youth. They cast their shadows before, if they cannot come from father or mother. The father and mother have a mixed share in the physical body and etheric body.

Sometimes a child may resemble its mother more, then its father more. This is due to the fact that there is a feminine in every man and a masculine in every woman. Here, four influences are at work. For the astral body and the ego, the situation is more complicated. What was put into it earlier is important. By way of comparison, I would like to mention something here: A person who has a certain individuality lives in very comfortable domestic circumstances, but due to some event he has to make do with a miserable apartment. This will have a certain influence on him, but nevertheless the person remains the same, and he has to adapt to the circumstances. The parents are not the creators, they are only the dwelling, and the living beings have to fit into it.

What comes from the woman has its influence primarily on the astral body, what comes from the man on the “I” of the child. The artistic, poetic comes more from the mother, because these are qualities that are attached to the astral. On the other hand, what has more to do with the ordering, practical life, with the “I” is connected, comes from the father. As Goethe says:

From my father I have the stature
And manly leadership;
From my mother the cheerful nature
And the desire to tell stories.

Here we must mention alcohol and its devastating effects. Only those who are unaware of this can underestimate its influence on their offspring. Alcohol has a terrible effect on the “ego” and on astral things. If we observe a child whose father is an alcoholic, the race could be so strong that it overcomes the damage; we find tendencies towards morbidity that are all connected with crippledness of the “I”, with cretinism. They are much more widespread than one might think and will become much worse in the next generations if spiritual science is not used to counteract them.

There are facts below the surface of life where the “I” has much greater deficiencies than one might think. In many cases, people are considered particularly gifted, for example poets. Today, however, language is not an admirable gift at all. In truth, the times write; a columnist, an entertainment writer, can be weak-minded. There are bound to be effects of the “I” that are connected to alcoholism. In women, shadows are also evident in the formation of the astral body, through instability and a flight of ideas. Hysteria also shows that the astral body is not in order. In this disease you can find confirmation of what esoteric science says about the relationship between man, woman and child.

We see, then, that we must substantially reshape the superficial concepts of inheritance. The essential thing in all these things is that our horizons are broadened on the spiritual side, but also on the moral side. Transformation is the gold of morality. To what extent does Schopenhauer's brilliant glimpse of light find a certain justification: “By man and woman seeking each other, the offspring are already working?” It is a fine concept that we have to form for ourselves. You see ardent, passionate desire, which goes down to the animalistic and up to the highest, where love unites man and woman. There is a point of view, an egotistical one, that arises from desire. It is brought about by tremendous immoral stupidity. It is not true that every sexual urge must be satisfied; on the contrary, it benefits everything, even health, when this is not the case. Where love is combined with purity, a soul will find the best cover. There is an ideal where every lower urge is silenced, not out of abstinence, and yet still provides for human offspring. What that means for certain things, people are not yet ready to understand, but it will be a great happiness. They will learn to understand how the creation of one sex or the other is connected with cosmic and other conditions. If a word were to be revealed today, the greatest mischief would arise. Today, only these things can be touched upon.

What happens in the spiritual world after death? That which went up rests in Devachan to re-embody itself. This person first envelops himself in an astral body. Just as a magnet moving under a paper on which iron filings are spread arranges the filings, so the astral matter arranges itself into a new body. If you could see occultly, you would see the astral matter settling. What is it? It is something that is mixed with the embers of desire that goes from man to woman. Where desire is bad, bad things are mixed in, where love is pure, the astral matter is not defiled. The last stage lies in the greater or lesser purity of the love relationship. We cannot ascribe qualities from past lives, but we can prevent astral matter from becoming contaminated. In such views, purity becomes respect for the freedom of the incarnating human being. One must have grasped the ideas of re-embodiment.

From the child we move on to the future generation. Every child must be a mystery to the educator, because there is something supersensory behind their life that wants to come out. Nurturing and caring for this maturing, this supersensory in the child is the only way to educate it. And we can say: if we want to give the next generation an existence, then we must value the child's freedom in education.

In the life of the present, mainly the recognition of the sensual is shown. When the supersensible is recognized first, then the future is linked to the present and the past. When these ideas will have an effect on our actions, on our blood, then we have brought theosophy into life. Those who do not want knowledge because it is too inconvenient for them, figuratively speaking, cut off the tree at the root. Knowledge is the root and growing into the views is the trunk and crown, and we achieve this growth by incorporating Theosophy into our whole lives.