Fourth Lecture

I have often drawn your attention to such phenomena in the world of facts, which clearly show that everything that people can imagine need not have much to do with reality. To substantiate this, I have pointed out that, for example, in their naivety, a good number of philosophers today talk about man having to be thought of as consisting of body and soul. Even the world-famous Wundtian philosophy talks of body and soul and professes to be free of prejudice. But in reality – and I have already pointed this out – what is all of Wundt's philosophy or similar philosophies? It is only the execution of what the Eighth General Council of Constantinople decided in 869: that one should not speak - roughly one could define the council decision, which was of course couched in terms of conditions at the time - when speaking of man, of body, soul and spirit, but that the spiritual is only a property of the soul, that one should only speak of body and soul. And the trichotomy of body, soul and spirit was, after all, a heretical view throughout the Middle Ages. The theological philosophers trembled when they were pushed by reality to hint at body, soul and spirit, because it was a heretical view. Philosophers still hold this view today. They only expound what was dogmatized by that Council of Constantinople in the past, and they believe that they are unprejudiced, they believe that they are expounding something that follows from their pure views and investigations, whereas in reality they are only expounding a council decision. One must look at things without illusion; one must look at reality. Our young students learn in philosophy what was decided at the Council of Constantinople in 869.