{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 103/1908-05-30_02/p016","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"Just imagine, for a moment, that humanity had entered into this most deeply materialistic age without Christianity. It would then have been impossible for it to find again the impulse upwards. Think away the Impulse that has been implanted in mankind through the Christ, then the whole of humanity would have had to fall into decadence, would have had to be bound forever to matter. As it is expressed in occultism, it would have been “seized by the force of gravity in matter” and would have been thrown out of its evolution. Thus we must imagine that in the post-Atlantean epoch, mankind made a movement downward into matter, and that before the lowest stage was reached, there came the other Impulse which impelled it again upward in the opposite direction. This was the Christ Impulse. Had the Christ Impulse been active earlier, humanity would never have come to a materialistic development at all. Had it fallen in the ancient Indian epoch, mankind would certainly have been permeated with the spiritual element of Christianity, but it would never have descended deeply enough into matter to have been able to produce all that we call today an outer physical culture. It may seem extraordinary to say that without Christianity there would never have been any railroads, any steamships etc., but for anyone who knows things in their relationship, it is a fact. Never would these means of culture have arisen out of the ancient Indian civilization. There exists a mysterious connection between Christianity and all that is today the so-called pride of mankind. Because Christianity waited until the right moment of time for its appearance, an external culture became possible, and because it entered just at the right moment, it became possible for those who unite themselves with the Christ Principle to be able to rise again out of materiality. However, since Christianity has been received without understanding, it has become very greatly materialized. Because it has been so greatly misunderstood, it has itself been materialistically interpreted. Thus, in a certain way, it is a very distorted, materialistic form which Christianity has assumed in the course of that period which we have just been following right up to our own times, and which we may designate as a second division of Christian history. Instead of the Last Supper, for example, being apprehended from its higher spiritual aspect, it has become materialized and has been represented as a transubstantiation of gross physical substance. And we could instance hundreds and hundreds of examples of the fact that Christianity as a spiritual phenomenon has not been understood.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"X. The Effect of the Christ Impulse Within Mankind","site_heading":null,"date":"1908-05-30","location":null,"word_count":432,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/103/1908-05-30_02/p016","alignment_confidence":"medium","alignment_reason":"beads:embedding","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"established","translator":"Maud B. Monges","identified_edition":"AP1962","book_title":"The Gospel of St. John","publisher":"Anthroposophic Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA103/English/AP1962/19080530a01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["English"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/103/1908-05-30_02/p016"},{"lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/103/1908-05-30_02/p016","paragraph_aligned":true}],"record":{"record_type":"unknown","scope":"volume","note":"How this text was taken down (shorthand transcript, listeners' notes or manuscript) is not on record here. Unknown is not an assurance of a stenogram: check the edition's own notes before resting an argument on one word.","evidence":null,"evidence_translation":null,"evidence_source":null},"unit_kind":{"kind":"second_lecture_same_day","base_unit":"GA 103/1908-05-30","note":"Another lecture given on the same date as 1908-05-30; the suffix only separates two lectures of one day."},"german_anchor":{"de_prefix":"1908-05-30_02","de_passages":[{"locus":"GA 103/1908-05-30_02/p021","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/103/1908-05-30_02/p021"},{"locus":"GA 103/1908-05-30_02/p022","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/103/1908-05-30_02/p022"}],"bead_confidence":"medium","pairing_state":"proposed","verified":false,"length_check":{"de_words":323,"en_words":580,"ratio":1.8,"partial":false},"correspondence":"established","note":"English passage numbering is edition-relative, so the same number need not name the same paragraph in the German. The German original passage(s) above are the edition-invariant anchor — fetch them (lang='de') to verify wording before quoting across editions."},"paired_german":{"status":"paired","german":[{"locus":"GA 103/1908-05-30_02/p021","passage_number":21,"text":"Fassen wir diesen Zeitpunkt einmal recht ins Auge: die geistige Verkündigung durch Moses und den Abschluß dieser Verkündigung, das Erscheinen des verkündeten Messias in dem Christus. Von dieser Zeitepoche an, die wir als einen ersten Abschnitt in der Geschichte des Christentums bezeichnen könnten, wird in die Menschheitsentwickelung hinein der reale Impuls gelegt zur Einheit und Brüderlichkeit, die da kommen soll im sechsten Zeitraum. Es ist, wie wenn eine Kraft in etwas hinabversenkt wird, die dann weiter wirkt, damit die Frucht nach und nach herauskommt. So wirkte diese Kraft weiter bis in unsere Zeit hinein, bis in die Zeit, die wir schildern mußten als eine solche, in welcher die Menschheit mit ihren intellektuellen und geistigen Kräften ganz hinuntergestiegen ist in die Materie. Man könnte nun fragen: Warum mußte denn das Christentum gerade zur Welt kommen als unmittelbarer Vorläufer der tiefsten materiellen Epoche?","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":141,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/103/1908-05-30_02/p021"},{"locus":"GA 103/1908-05-30_02/p022","passage_number":22,"text":"Denken Sie einmal, die Menschheit wäre ohne das Christentum eingetreten in diese tiefste materielle Epoche. Es wäre dann für sie unmöglich gewesen, den Impuls nach aufwärts wiederzufinden. Denken Sie sich den Impuls, der der Menschheit durch den Christus eingepflanzt worden ist, fort, und die ganze Menschheit müßte in die Dekadenz fallen, müßte mit der Materie sich auf ewig verbinden; sie würde, wie es im Okkultismus heißt, «von der Schwere der Materie erfaßt» und aus ihrer Entwickelung hinausgeworfen werden. So müssen wir uns vorstellen, daß die Menschheit in der nachatlantischen Kulturepoche einen Ruck hinuntergeht in die Materie. Und es kam in die Menschheit, bevor die niederste Stufe erreicht wurde, der andere Impuls, der wieder hinauf in die entgegengesetzte Richtung stößt. Das war der Christus-Impuls. Hätte der Christus-Impuls früher gewirkt, so wäre die Menschheit überhaupt nicht zur materiellen Entwickelung gekommen. Wäre er hineingefallen in die alte indische Kulturepoche, würde die Menschheit gewiß durchdrungen worden sein von dem spirituellen Element des Christentums, aber die Menschheit würde nie so tief hinuntergestiegen sein, daß sie alles das, was wir heute äußere physische Kultur nennen, hätte hervorbringen können.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":182,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/103/1908-05-30_02/p022"}],"english":["GA 103/1908-05-30_02/p015","GA 103/1908-05-30_02/p016"],"method":"embedding","confidence":"medium","correspondence":"established","length_check":{"de_words":323,"en_words":580,"ratio":1.8,"partial":false},"pairing_state":"proposed","verified":false},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.06,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":5133,"original_word_count":4820,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Maud B. Monges","identified_edition":"AP1962","book_title":"The Gospel of St. John","publisher":"Anthroposophic Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA103/English/AP1962/19080530a01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 103/1908-05-30_02/p021","GA 103/1908-05-30_02/p022"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"medium","note":"Every load-bearing name in the German counterpart appears in this English passage. That is a check on NAMES only: a translation can keep every name and still reverse who acts on whom, change a number, or soften a claim. Read the German for anything you intend to rest an argument on."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}