9. The Realm of Mothers. The Glorious Matter

He is not attracted directly by the Christ-male, as the penitents are, but he is first attracted by that which, as the female, belongs to the Christ. And that leads him in turn to the karmically connected Gretchen soul, again to the woman. There you see delicately interwoven into the poetry this deep mystery of man's relationship to the spiritual world. For how could it not, I would like to say, be felt with dismay when the occult facts are revealed to us: the disembodied soul, which still has the elements within it - nature, which must first be separated - which must neutralize itself through the feminine. And we see how, in the striving towards neutralization, because we are dealing with the masculine, Faust, the feminine must assert itself as “pulling towards”. Something quite wonderful is presented in this poem. And it is clearly and distinctly suggested to us that it should be so. Thus, through the mouth of Doctor Marianus, Faust will strive towards the feminine, that is, the spiritual eternal feminine, but the secret, the mystery. When he spiritually beholds the gloriosa mater, he says: