Christ and the Human Soul III

A difficulty of course arises here, especially for the anthroposophical world conception. To be faced with this difficulty we need only direct our attention to the relationship of the concepts of ‘Guilt and Sin’ and of ‘Karma.’ Many people get over this by saying that they believe Karma to be a debt which a man contracts in anyone of his incarnations; he bears this debt with him, with his Karma, and discharges it later; this, in the course of incarnations, compensation is brought about. Here begins the difficulty. These people then say: ‘How can this be reconcilable with the Christian acceptation of the conception of the forgiveness of sins through Christ?’ And yet again the idea of the forgiveness of sins is intimately bound up with true Christianity. It is only necessary to think of this one example: Christ on the Cross between two malefactors. The malefactor on the left hand mocks at Christ: ‘If Thou wilt be God, help Thyself and us.’ The malefactor on the right held that the other ought not to speak thus, for both had merited their fate of crucifixion—the just award of their deeds; whereas He was innocent, and had yet to experience the same fate. The malefactor on the right added to this: ‘Think of me when Thou art in Thy Kingdom.’ And Christ answered him: ‘Verily, I say unto thee, to-day shalt thou be with Me in Paradise.’ It is not permissible merely to gainsay these words and omit them from the Gospel, for they are very significant. The difficulty arises from the question: If this malefactor on the right has to wash away what he has brought about in his Karma, what does it mean when Christ, as it were, pardoning and forgiving him, says: ‘To-day shalt thou be with Me in Paradise?’ It may appear that the malefactor on the right will have to wash away his debt with his Karma, even as the one on the left. Why is there a difference made by Christ between the malefactor on the right and the one on the left? There is no doubt at all that the conception of Karma is here met by a difficulty that is not easy to solve. It is solved however when we try to probe more deeply into Christianity by means of Spiritual Science. And now I shall approach the subject from quite another side, the nature of which is already known to you, but which can bring certain remarkable circumstances to light.