{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 170/1916-08-07/p013","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"And now think of the days of antiquity, when man's knowledge was acquired through faculties of inner clairvoyance. Man did not then expend his forces upon the outer world to anything like the same extent. The people of ancient Egypt and ancient Chaldea acquired their knowledge through atavistic clairvoyance and not nearly so much by observation of the external world. Our own age is, in a sense, exactly the opposite in this respect. Nowadays a very great deal of knowledge is absorbed from the world outside and very little is added from the inner being of man. The Greeks were the outstanding example of the ‘golden mean’ in this respect. That they were able to hold this ‘golden mean’ was not due alone to their special qualities. They did, of course, possess these special qualities, but the self-contained glory of their civilisation was also due to the fact that the area of the Earth inhabited by the Greek people was relatively small. Moreover they had comparatively little knowledge of the rest of the world. What knowledge had the Greeks of countries other than Asia Minor and a little further Eastwards into Asia? They knew little of Africa and of America, and of the rest of the Earth they knew absolutely nothing at all. Plato's knowledge concerning the inner nature of the Good and the function of certain inner parts of the human organism was very largely due to the limited area of the world to which Greek knowledge could be applied. For this reason it was possible in Greece to preserve man's spiritual forces for the purpose of his inner development. But even the Greeks applied less of their powers for the purpose of inner development than the ancient Egyptian and Chaldean peoples—not to speak of the ancient Persians and Indians. In our age, when practically the whole Earth has been explored, everyone is bent upon acquiring as much knowledge of the external world as he possibly can! If all this knowledge of the external world were as *intensive* as it *extensive* then people would have very few powers left over for the work of transforming the physical body into the head of the next incarnation. And the most learned would have far fewer powers than the simple peasants! One can only be thankful that when the majority of people travel about the world today, they are content with simply turning over the pages of Baedeker or some other book of travel, and really do not take in very much! So you see, they are not, after all, depriving themselves of very much inner power; If it were otherwise, those human beings who are always hunting for sensation, who only want to get their knowledge from the outside world, would be facing a grave danger. The danger would be that in their next incarnation they would return with a head produced from a body that had undergone very little transformation. The head would be exceedingly animal-like in appearance. This is bound to happen, when, in the previous incarnation, comparatively few formative forces were preserved for the work of transformation.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"Human Knowledge and Its Significance for Man and the Cosmos","site_heading":null,"date":"1916-08-07","location":null,"word_count":519,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/170/1916-08-07/p013","alignment_confidence":"medium","alignment_reason":"beads:length","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"not_established","translator":null,"identified_edition":"Singles","book_title":"The Riddle of Humanity","publisher":null,"publisher_inferred":false,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA170/English/Singles/19160807p02.html","evidence":null,"reason":"source_says_translator_unknown","note":"The source page itself says the translator is unknown. No translator is established for this lecture: nothing at the level of the lecture names one. Do not attribute this English to a translator, and do not borrow a credit from another lecture of the volume. Cite the German for anything load-bearing."},"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/170/1916-08-07/p013"},{"lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/170/1916-08-07/p013","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. 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Aber das, was da wallt und webt, das wirkt eben in uns, um nach dem Tode in Aktualität überzutreten und unseren Organismus umzuwandeln. Es sammelt sich alles, was durch Erkenntnis gewonnen wird, an, um unseren Organismus umzuwandeln, mit Ausnahme dessen, was wir verwenden, um die äußere Welt aufzufassen. Was wir verwenden, um im gewöhnlichen Sinne die äußere Welt aufzufassen, das geht in einer gewissen Weise verloren für unsere Entwickelung, das entziehen wir unserer Entwickelung. Geradeso, wie wir dem totalen Fortentwickelungsprozeß des Weizens alle die Weizenkörner entziehen — es sind viel mehr als diejenigen, die wieder in die Erde gestreut werden -, die wir als Nahrungsmittel verwenden, so entziehen wir uns tatsächlich auch recht viel mehr, namentlich in der gegenwärtigen Entwickelungsperiode der Menschheit, als wir behalten, indem wir Äußeres uns aneignen. Denken wir zurück an ältere Zeiten, in denen die Menschen noch mehr durch innere hellseherische Wissenschaft das wußten, was sie eben wußten. Die gaben sich nicht so aus nach der äußeren Welt. Solch eine Bevölkerung wie die alte ägyptische, die alte chaldäische, hat das, was sie gewußt hat, durch atavistisches Hellsehen gewußt, und wenig nur durch die äußere Entwickelung. Heute leben wir in einer Zeit, die gewissermaßen in dieser Beziehung entgegengesetzt ist. Heute wird viel von außen herein aufgenommen und wenig vom Innern der Entwickelung hinzugefügt. Die Griechen hielten jene wunderschöne Mitte einer gewissen Kulturentwickelung, die nicht allein dadurch bedingt war, daß diese Griechen so besonders veranlagt waren. Das waren sie ja gewiß, aber damit allein ist es nicht getan. Sie verdanken diese Geschlossenheit ihrer ganzen Kultur auch dem Umstande, daß die Erdenfläche, die das griechische Volk einnahm, eine verhältnismäßig kleine war, auch in bezug auf die Kenntnisse der übrigen Erde. Was wußten die Griechen viel von anderem als von Kleinasien, nach Asien hin, was wußten sie viel von Afrika, von Amerika schon gar nichts; von einem großen Teil von Europa wußten sie auch nichts. Daß Plato noch ein Wissen haben konnte von der Moralität, von der Sophrosyne, der Dikaiosyne, das ist vielfach dem Umstande zu verdanken, daß der Schauplatz, den die griechische Erkenntnis äußerlich umspannte, ein kleiner war. Daher war es noch möglich, viele von den Weisheits-Geisteskräften für die innere Entwickelung zu behalten. Aber sie verwendeten schon weniger für die innere Entwickelung als etwa die alten Ägypter oder Chaldäer, oder gar die alten Perser oder die alten Inder. In unserer Zeit, wo nach und nach die ganze Erde erforscht und zugänglich geworden ist, da suchen die Menschen möglichst viel an äußeren Erkenntnissen zu erwerben. Wie hat das zugenommen! Wenn es so intensiv wäre, wie es extensiv ist, dann würden die Menschen unendlich wenig, und gerade die Gebildetsten viel, viel weniger als irgendein Bauer mitnehmen, um den physischen Leib umzuwandeln in den physischen Kopf der nächsten Inkarnation. Aber Gott sei Dank, die meisten sind ja so gereist, daß sie nicht viel angeschaut haben, sondern daß sie fein nach dem Baedeker oder anderen Reisebüchern gegangen sind, und trotz des großen Umkreises doch nicht viel kennengelernt haben; so entziehen sie sich doch nicht alles. Sonst würde gerade bei denen, die überall nach Sensationen haschen, die nur alles, was sie wissen, von außen wissen wollen, die Gefahr vorliegen, daß sie in der nächsten Inkarnation mit einem Kopf zur Welt kämen, der recht wenig umgestalteter übriger Leib sein wird, das heißt, der sehr tierisch aussehen würde; denn das würde das Schicksal sein, wenn wenig Bildekräfte angesammelt würden.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":670,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/170/1916-08-07/p008"}],"english":["GA 170/1916-08-07/p012","GA 170/1916-08-07/p013"],"method":"length","confidence":"medium","correspondence":"established","length_check":{"de_words":670,"en_words":790,"ratio":1.18,"partial":false},"pairing_state":"verified","verified":true,"evidence":["length","anchors","reader"],"reader_german":["GA 170/1916-08-07/p008"],"reader_part":true},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.11,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":4214,"original_word_count":3801,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"not_established","translator":null,"identified_edition":"Singles","book_title":"The Riddle of Humanity","publisher":null,"publisher_inferred":false,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA170/English/Singles/19160807p02.html","evidence":null,"reason":"source_says_translator_unknown","note":"The source page itself says the translator is unknown. No translator is established for this lecture: nothing at the level of the lecture names one. Do not attribute this English to a translator, and do not borrow a credit from another lecture of the volume. Cite the German for anything load-bearing.","warning":"No translator is recorded for this edition. An unattributed translation cannot be weighed as a witness: you cannot tell which hand made the choices in it. Cite the German for anything load-bearing."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 170/1916-08-07/p008"],"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. 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