Esoteric Lesson

What Lucifer brought us, namely that we moved into our physical and etheric bodies and did not remain floating above them, was actually good for us, for it enabled our ego to gain the power of knowledge and memory. Memory is, of course, something that also has a restraining effect. Without it, however, we would not be able to cope in the way we are stuck in our bodies; above all, we would not be able to distinguish between reality and illusion. Suppose we thought of a person we had known twenty years ago and encountered this memory image and greeted it; we would have to call this a hallucination. However, we would indulge in this kind of hallucination if we considered something backward to be something contemporary, and this is something that will often be the case in the coming times. The Luciferic beings who remained behind during the Mystery of Golgotha have, so to speak, created a vanguard in certain souls, whom they have taken possession of after their last death. These are souls who lived at the time of Tauler and Meister Eckhart in the 13th century and belonged to the community of the Beguines. They are now seeking to confuse people's minds in the coming times, and they are using the old religions of Brahmanism and Buddhism as a means to this end. These were right for their time when they were given to the ancient Indians, and Brahmanism in particular was a much more spiritual religion than Christianity still is today. The fact that it is not more advanced is due to the fact that Europeans have missed the opportunity since the Middle Ages to develop what was rightfully theirs. Above all, however, a high spiritual culture will sweep across Europe like a tidal wave from China, which will greatly impress Europeans because, due to its great age, which dates back to Atlantis, it is far superior to present-day Christianity. What is happening now in China may be of political significance on the surface, but as an expression of a much more far-reaching spiritual significance, esotericists must read a book by an outstanding Chinese author: Ku Hung Ming, “China's Defense Against European Ideas,” which has also been translated into German. Ku Hung Ming is an important thinker. What he says is not wrong, and yet there is much in it that should give esotericists pause for thought. He says that Christian missionaries came to China to bring Christianity into an ancient, high culture. Did they succeed? No. Something else happened instead. The missionaries brought Chinese culture back to Europe, and since the French Revolution, Europe has become much more Chinese than it even realizes. This Chinese man knows very well that his people are the keepers of humanity's memory and that this fact makes a deep impression on Europeans. But memory, as I said, is Lucifer's gift. Through him, we descended into our physical bodies and were expelled from the paradise of the spiritual worlds. We must now undo Lucifer's deed, but we must not think that it was not necessary.