{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 126/1910-12-29/p024-p025","extent":"range","passage_number":24,"through":25,"paragraph_count":2,"first_locus":"GA 126/1910-12-29/p024","last_locus":"GA 126/1910-12-29/p025","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"title":"Lecture III","date":"1910-12-29","location":null,"alignment_confidence":"high","alignment_reason":"beads:length","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"established","translator":"D. S. Osmond and Charles Davy","identified_edition":"RSP1982","book_title":"Occult History","publisher":"Rudolf Steiner Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA126/English/RSP1982/19101229p01.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"]},"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},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.05,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":6485,"original_word_count":6175,"may_be_abridged":false},"site_heading":"Spiritual Hierarchies and Human Incarnation in History","site_heading_note":"A heading the site wrote for this unit from a summary of it; not in the edition, and not the words of Rudolf Steiner or of the translator. Cite the unit by its title and locus, never by this heading, and do not quote it.","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/126/1910-12-29/p024-p025","json_url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/126/1910-12-29/p024-p025.json","lecture_url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/126/1910-12-29#p024","word_count":899,"quote_safe":true,"passages":[{"passage_number":24,"locus":"GA 126/1910-12-29/p024","text":"Now it is of the greatest interest to show by the example of a particular personality how the knowledge that was inspired into humanity under the influence of higher Powers assumed in a man of the Greco-Latin epoch a character adapted to the physical plane. Thus we can show how Eabani, in the incarnation between the life as Eabani and the life as Aristotle, was able under the influence of the ancient Mystery-teachings, into which forces streamed from the super-sensible worlds, to imbibe the principles which in certain Mystery-schools were essential to the further development of the human soul. We will not speak of the particular characteristics of the different Mystery-schools, but will direct our attention to one kind of Mystery-school where, by the awakening of particular feelings, the soul developed to the stage of being able to penetrate into the superphysical world. In such Mystery-schools the feelings and impulses paramountly awakened were those capable of eradicating every trace of egoism from the soul. The soul came to realise that in truth it must always be egoistic when incarnated in a physical body. The whole range, the whole import of egoism an the physical plane were impressed into the soul; and such a soul felt shattered to the depths at having to admit: “Hitherto I have known only egoism; indeed, in the physical body I cannot be anything else than an egoist.” Such a soul was leagues away from the commonplace standpoint of people who are forever saying: “I want this, not for myself, but for someone else.” To overcome egoism and to acquire the urge towards the universal human and the cosmic is not such an easy matter as many people imagine. For it must be preceded by the complete elimination of every trace of egoism in the impulses of the soul. In the Mysteries to which I am here referring, the soul had to learn to feel pity and compassion for everything human, for everything cosmic—compassion born from the overcoming of the physical plane. It might then be hoped that such a soul would bring down again from the higher worlds the true feeling of compassion for every living creature and all existent beings.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":366,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/126/1910-12-29/p024","german_anchor":{"de_prefix":"1910-12-29","de_passages":[{"locus":"GA 126/1910-12-29/p023","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/126/1910-12-29/p023"}],"bead_confidence":"high","pairing_state":"proposed","verified":false,"length_check":{"de_words":365,"en_words":366,"ratio":1.0,"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."},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"D. S. Osmond and Charles Davy","identified_edition":"RSP1982","book_title":"Occult History","publisher":"Rudolf Steiner Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA126/English/RSP1982/19101229p01.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 126/1910-12-29/p023"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"high","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."}},{"passage_number":25,"locus":"GA 126/1910-12-29/p025","text":"But still another feeling was to be developed—a feeling paramount among many others. If man is to penetrate into the spiritual world, he must realise that everything in that world differs from the things of the physical world. He who is to confront the spiritual world face to face must stand before it as before something completely unknown. Fear of the unknown is present there as an actual danger. Therefore in these Mysteries, in order to equip itself to banish all the feelings of fear, anxiety, terror and horror known to man, the soul must first experience them to their very depths. Then the pupil was armed for the ascent into the unknown purlieus of the spiritual world. The soul of the pupil of these Mysteries had to be so trained as to acquire an all-embracing, universal feeling of compassion and of fearlessness. This was the ordeal to be endured by every soul in those ancient Mysteries in which Eabani participated when he appeared again in the incarnation lying between his lives as Eabani and as Aristotle. This too he experienced. And it arose again in Aristotle like a memory of earlier incarnations. He was able to define the essence of tragedy precisely because out of such memories there arose in him at the spectacle of Greek tragedy the realisation that here was an echo, a reproduction carried outwards to the physical plane, of that Mystery-training wherein the soul is purified through experiencing compassion and fear. Thus the hero and the whole construction of a tragedy must present a spectacle which on a milder level evokes in the audience compassion with the face of the hero and fear in face of the destiny and terrible death that beckon him. And so the experiences undergone by the soul of the ancient mystic were woven into the succession of events in the tragedy, into the plot and movement of the drama: purification, catharsis, through fear and compassion, and like an echo, the man of the Greek epoch was to experience this an the physical plane. What was formerly a great educative principle was now be experienced through the medium of aesthetic enjoyment. And when what Aristotle had learnt in earlier incarnations rose up into his personal consciousness, he was the one able to give the unique definition of tragedy which has become classic and has had such an effect that it was still accepted by Lessing in the 18th century, and through the 19th century played a role which caused whole libraries to be written about it. As a matter of fact it would be no great loss if the larger part of these volumes had been burnt; for they were written in complete ignorance of what has just been said—that here we have to do with a projection down into art of something that belongs to the spiritual life. These authors had no inkling that Aristotle was communicating an ancient secret of the Mysteries when he said: A tragedy is a weaving together round a hero of successive actions, which are able to arouse in the spectator the emotions of fear and compassion in order that a catharsis may take place in his soul.[^4]","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":533,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/126/1910-12-29/p025","german_anchor":{"de_prefix":"1910-12-29","de_passages":[{"locus":"GA 126/1910-12-29/p024","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/126/1910-12-29/p024"}],"bead_confidence":"high","pairing_state":"proposed","verified":false,"length_check":{"de_words":528,"en_words":533,"ratio":1.01,"partial":false},"correspondence":"established","note":"English passage numbering is edition-relative, so the same number need not name the same paragraph in the German. 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Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 126/1910-12-29/p024"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"high","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. 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Da können wir als ein Beispiel anführen, wie Eabani in derjenigen seiner Inkarnationen, die zwischen der Persönlichkeit des Eabani und des Aristoteles liegt, unter dem Einfluß der alten Mysterienlehren mit ihren aus den übersinnlichen Welten herabkommenden Kräften aufnehmen konnte das, worauf eigentlich in gewissen Mysterienschulen die Fortentwickelung der menschlichen Seele beruht. Wir wollen jetzt nicht wiederholen, was Charaktereigentümlichkeit der verschiedenen Mysterienschulen war, wir wollen auf eine Art derselben unseren geistigen Blick richten, auf jene, wo durch die Erregung ganz bestimmter Gefühle die Seele fortentwickelt wurde, so daß sie eindringen lernte in die überphysische Welt. In solchen Mysterien wurden in der Seele namentlich jene Empfindungen, jene Impulse erregt, die geeignet waren, von Grund aus allen Egoismus auszurotten aus der Seele. Es wurde der Seele klargemacht, wie sie im Grunde genommen immer egoistisch sein muß, wenn sie im physischen Leibe verkörpert ist. Es wurde der ganze Umfang und die ganze Bedeutung des Egoismus für den physischen Plan sozusagen in Impulsen auf die entsprechende Seele abgeladen. Und tief, tief zerknirscht fühlte sich eine solche Seele, die sich sagen mußte: Ich habe bisher nichts anderes gekannt als den Egoismus, ich kann ja im physischen Leibe gar nichts anderes sein als ein Egoist. Ja, weit ist eine solche Seele entfernt worden von dem billigen Standpunkte solcher Menschen, die als jedes zweite Wort im Munde führen: Ich will ja die Sache nicht für mich, sondern für einen anderen. Den Egoismus zu überwinden und den Zug nach dem Allgemein-Menschlichen und Kosmischen sich anzueignen, ist nicht so leicht, wie mancher sich vorstellt. Diesem Aneignen muß vorangehen eine völlige Niederschmetterung der Seele über den Umfang des Egoismus in den Impulsen dieser Seele. Mitleid mit allem Menschlichen, mit allem Kosmischen mußte die Seele lernen in den Mysterien, die ich da meine, Mitleid durch die Überwindung des physischen Planes. Dann konnte man von ihr hoffen, daß sie wieder heruntertragen würde aus den höheren Welten das wahrhafte Mitgefühl für alles Lebendige und alles Seiende.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":365,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/126/1910-12-29/p023"},{"locus":"GA 126/1910-12-29/p024","passage_number":24,"text":"Aber noch ein anderes Gefühl sollte namentlich entwickelt werden als ein Hauptgefühl neben mancherlei anderem. Wenn der Mensch eindringen soll in die geistige Welt, dann muß er sich klar sein, daß dort alles anders ist als in der physischen Welt. Wie vor einem völlig Unbekannten muß man stehen, wenn man der geistigen Welt Auge in Auge gegenübertritt. Da ist wirklich das Gefühl vorhanden, durch das man in Gefahr gerät, das Gefühl der Furcht vor dem Unbekannten. Und deshalb mußte die Seele in solchen Mysterien durchleben alles, was die Seele des Menschen überhaupt an Furcht und Angst und Schreck und Grauen erleben konnte, um sich abzugewöhnen die Gefühle von Furcht und Angst und Schreck und Grauen. Dann war der Mensch gewappnet, hinaufzusteigen in die ihrem Inhalte nach ihm unbekannte geistige Welt. So mußte also die Seele des Schülers der Mysterien durchgehen durch die Erziehung zum umfassenden universellen Gefühl des Mitleids und zum universellen Gefühl der Furchtlosigkeit. Das machte jede Seele in denjenigen alten Mysterien durch, an denen Eabani teilnahm, als er wieder erschienen war in der Inkarnation, die zwischen Eabani und Aristoteles steht. Das machte auch er durch. Und nun trat das wie eine Erinnerung an frühere Inkarnationen in Aristoteles zutage. Er konnte deshalb die Theorie der Tragödie geben, weil er aus solchen Erinnerungen heraus beim Anschauen der griechischen Tragödie darauf kam, wie in dieser ein Nachklang ist, gleichsam ein äußeres, auf den physischen Plan herausgetragenes Nachspiel der Mysterienerziehung, wo die Seele durch Mitleid und Furcht geläutert wird. So sollte der dramatische Held und der ganze Aufbau einer Tragödie vor den Zuschauern etwas darleben, woran der Zuschauer abgeschwächt erleben kann Mitleid mit dem Schicksal des tragischen Helden und Furcht vor dem Ausgang seines Schicksals, vor dem schauervollen Tod, der ihm winkt. So war hineinverwoben in den dramatischen Fortgang der Tragödie, in das Weben und Leben der Tragödie, was in der Seele des alten Mysten vorging: die Läuterung, die Reinigung, die Katharsis durch Furcht und Mitleid. Und wie ein Nachklang sollte auf dem physischen Plan der Angehörige der griechischen Kulturperiode empfinden den Durchgang durch Furcht und Mitleid. Künstlerisch sollte man erleben, ästhetisch genießen das, was früher ein großes Erziehungsprinzip war. Und als das, was Aristoteles in früheren Inkarnationen gelernt hatte, in seine Persönlichkeit kam, da war er der geeignete Mann, diese eigenartige Definition der Tragödie zu geben, die so klassisch geworden ist und so großartig gewirkt hat, daß sie im 18. Jahrhundert noch von Lessing aufgenommen wurde und durch das 19. Jahrhundert hindurch eine solche Rolle gespielt hat, daß über diese Definition ganze Bibliotheken geschrieben worden sind. Man würde übrigens nicht viel verlieren, wenn der größte Teil dessen, was in den Bibliotheken liegt, verbrannt würde, denn es wurde mit einem vollständigen Verkennen dessen geschrieben, was vorhin gesagt worden ist, daß wir es nämlich damit zu tun haben, daß in die Kunst etwas herunterprojiziert wird, was im Geistigen liegt. Und die das schrieben, ahnten nicht, daß Aristoteles ein altes Mysteriengeheimnis gab, wenn er sagte: Eine Tragödie ist eine Zusammenfügung aufeinanderfolgender Handlungen, die gruppiert werden um einen Helden und die geeignet sind, im Zuschauer das Gefühl von Furcht und Mitleid zu erregen, damit eine Läuterung in der Seele des Zuschauers eintreten könne.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":528,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/126/1910-12-29/p024"}],"beads":[{"from":[24],"to":[23],"confidence":"high","pairing_state":"proposed"},{"from":[25],"to":[24],"confidence":"high","pairing_state":"proposed"}],"note":"Paired by the paragraph aligner; each language numbers its own paragraphs. A bead at either end of the span can carry text beyond it (the `from` numbers show what each bead covers)."}}