{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p018-p022","extent":"range","passage_number":18,"through":22,"paragraph_count":5,"first_locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p018","last_locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p022","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"title":"20. How Does the Soul Find Its True Essence?","date":"1914-05-08","location":null,"alignment_confidence":"high","alignment_reason":"beads:identity","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"established","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2024","book_title":"Death and Immortality in the Light of Spiritual Science","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA069d/English/SOL2024/19140508p01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["English"]},"record":{"record_type":"mixed_sources","scope":"volume","note":"This volume draws on more than one kind of record (transcripts, notes, documents). Check the volume's own front matter before weighing a single passage.","evidence":"Im Anhang Notizen und Berichte von weiteren Vorträgen","evidence_translation":"In the appendix, notes and reports of further lectures","evidence_source":"Rudolf Steiner Verlag Gesamtverzeichnis 2022, volume subtitle. The translation is the maintainer's, not a published one."},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.02,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":10124,"original_word_count":9939,"may_be_abridged":false},"site_heading":null,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p018-p022","json_url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p018-p022.json","lecture_url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/69d/1914-05-08#p018","word_count":1882,"quote_safe":true,"passages":[{"passage_number":18,"locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p018","text":"The activity of attention must increase in an unlimited way for spiritual researchers, or rather for those who want to become spiritual researchers. While we otherwise come to develop our interest in this or that through external circumstances, the spiritual researcher must develop concentration in an inner, skillful way. Arbitrarily, through strong inner exertion of the soul's power, the spiritual researcher must draw together everything that is present in his soul and, as far as possible, direct it toward something that is not prompted by external influences, whether it be ideas formed in the soul itself or those suggested by knowledgeable spiritual researchers. One allows these ideas to arise arbitrarily in one's soul at certain moments; otherwise, one tries to put oneself in a state where the outer senses perceive nothing, as in sleep, where ordinary thinking comes to a standstill, as in sleep, except that the whole soul is directed with all its powers toward the single idea that one holds on to for as long as one can. This is called concentration. You can read more about this in the aforementioned books. The more one uses such ideas, which in a sense have no model in the external world, the better; the more one places symbolic ideas at the center of consciousness, the better. And now it is a matter of the spiritual researcher doing this exercise over and over again; depending on their abilities, some will achieve something in a short time, others only after years, but as it is presented to us, we achieve, so to speak — the present development of humanity makes this possible — the ability to increase something in the soul by behaving in this way. Powers that otherwise lie dormant in the soul, as if in its depths, are brought to the surface when we repeatedly and patiently, with perseverance, perform such exercises of concentration. One does not become a spiritual researcher in an external, tumultuous way, but through such processes in the soul as [they] are described in the increase of attention to the infinite.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":345,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p018","witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2024","book_title":"Death and Immortality in the Light of Spiritual Science","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA069d/English/SOL2024/19140508p01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 69d/1914-05-08/p018"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"high","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. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}},{"passage_number":19,"locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p019","text":"Then, at an appropriate moment, something occurs that can now be called — I expressly note that no particular importance is attached to the expression itself, that it is not intended to prove anything — one attains something that can be called a “process of spiritual chemistry.” And as I discuss this process of spiritual chemistry, you will see that modern spiritual science, as it is meant here, seeks the true essence of the soul in a similar — but only similar — way to how natural science attempts to unravel the mysteries of nature. Only because spiritual science enters the spiritual realm must it be different in its methods and preparatory work from natural science.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":116,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p019","witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2024","book_title":"Death and Immortality in the Light of Spiritual Science","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA069d/English/SOL2024/19140508p01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 69d/1914-05-08/p019"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"high","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. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}},{"passage_number":20,"locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p020","text":"Spiritual chemistry! Well, if we want to use the expression as one that is supposed to make the matter understandable to us: When you look at water, you cannot see that the chemist can separate hydrogen from it, because hydrogen cannot be seen in water. Water extinguishes fire, hydrogen burns. Just as little as the essence of hydrogen can be seen when you have water in front of you, so little can the essence of the soul be seen in the human being standing before us in the body. But just as the chemist separates hydrogen from water as something that has completely different properties from water, so the spiritual researcher, using his own soul as a tool for his research, separates his soul from his body through concentration; he separates his spiritual-soul from his physical-bodily. If an abstract, monistic natural science or worldview that does not take facts into account calls this dualism, one can calmly bear such a reproach. One might just as well say that there is dualism in water; water is not merely a unity, a monos, but in order to get to know it, one must extract the hydrogen. Just as hydrogen can be extracted from water by physical chemistry, so the spiritual-soul aspect is separated from the physical-bodily aspect by processes such as the one described above—other such processes can be found in the books mentioned. And the spiritual researcher then experiences the significant, the great moment when he can really connect meaning with words that, if one knows nothing about the facts of spiritual experience, one cannot connect with meaning: I experience myself as a soul-spiritual being independent of my body, outside my body. And since I do not want to speak in abstractions, but rather about the facts of spiritual experience, about the facts of discovering the true nature of the soul, I will not refrain from describing individual experiences that the spiritual researcher goes through.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":324,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p020","witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2024","book_title":"Death and Immortality in the Light of Spiritual Science","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA069d/English/SOL2024/19140508p01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 69d/1914-05-08/p020"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"high","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. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}},{"passage_number":21,"locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p021","text":"If you stand in ordinary life, where, like hydrogen to oxygen, the soul-spiritual is bound to the physical, then, dear audience, you see the world in such a way that you know: you develop the power of your soul through the tools of your body; you use your senses, your brain; you live in this body of yours. — The first thing you know, after doing the exercises I mentioned, is that you live with your soul and spirit outside your body. This is what you might call the power of thought. In ordinary life, you know about this power of thought: you can use it because your thinking is connected to your brain. But now you experience yourself weaving thoughts and existing outside your brain. What I am telling you is not a fairy tale or a hypothesis, but something that anyone who does the relevant exercises can experience; they come to know: now you live in your thought life as if hovering around your own brain; the power of your thinking develops outside your body. This moment is experienced as particularly striking, one might say particularly shocking. If you make an effort to do the exercises for a while, there comes a time when you cannot yet really experience thinking outside the brain. It is something that spreads like a dreamlike twilight, as a result of concentration; but the moment when you submerge yourself back into the brain, when the thinking that takes place outside the body merges into the thinking inside the body, is actually the first thing you notice very clearly. You feel how you submerge again with the being you experienced outside your body, like something you penetrate with difficulty, and how, in pleasant currents, you feel your thinking being draw into your body and permeate your brain in order to use it again for external thinking. These facts are such that it is understandable that many people today must say: “He who says this is talking nonsense; these are the fantasies of a half-madman.” But these are the facts through which people will recognize how to learn to recognize the true nature of the soul. These are facts that will spread in the culture of the future, for souls thirst for them, even if they are not yet conscious of it. These facts will spread just as the Copernican worldview once spread, that the earth moves through space at great speed.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":407,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p021","witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2024","book_title":"Death and Immortality in the Light of Spiritual Science","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA069d/English/SOL2024/19140508p01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 69d/1914-05-08/p021"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"high","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. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}},{"passage_number":22,"locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p022","text":"So the first thing that can be separated from the physical body is the power of thought, and if one has the perseverance to continue the exercises described for a longer period of time, one can experience this emancipation from the physical organ of thought as one's first supersensible experience. It is only a matter of overcoming certain obstacles in order to have such experiences. People, for example, whose interests are limited to what constitutes physical existence alone, who are unable to develop broad-minded interests, will certainly encounter serious obstacles when they attempt what has just been described. A broad-mindedness of interests, an ability to respond to the beauty and sublimity that every being in the physical world already offers, must be inherent in the soul. Those who are only interested in themselves will notice that to the same extent that they do the exercises — anyone can do them, the important thing is to do them correctly — those who are completely absorbed in their usual egoistic thinking will notice that, as they progress through the exercises described, something comes over their soul that can be called a certain inner fear of the world they are to enter, which they experience outside the body. This fear is basically always present in the soul, only one is not aware of it. In spiritual science, one speaks of the threshold that separates the sensory world from the spiritual, the earthly from the super-earthly. It is said that one must cross this threshold, and it is even said that this threshold is guarded by a guardian, which of course refers to a spiritual force. This means that it is true, and spiritual science confirms this, that, as Fichte says, the spiritual world is always around us and that we can also find our way into it. Why does this spiritual world not always appear before the human soul like the physical world? Because what the budding spiritual researcher can experience through experiences such as those just described causes fear to arise in the soul, because this fear is in the soul; and this fear is a good remedy against an immature intrusion into the spiritual world. This fear is always there in souls, but it does not manifest itself as fear; rather, it manifests itself in the fact that people slacken in the efforts they could make to enter the spiritual world. They become seemingly casual, no longer interested in continuing the exercises; but in truth it is fear that they do not feel because they do not perceive it as fear. One can even say that spiritual research proves with certainty where the materialistic attitude of humanity actually comes from. In our time, there are materialistic souls who say that either one cannot speak of a spiritual world, or that one should not concern oneself with it because human cognition is directed only toward the sensory world. They also say that it is unscientific to speak of a life in the spirit. Yes, such people – today they are elegantly called “monists,” in the past they were called “materialists” – consider themselves particularly scientific when they completely reject the spiritual world, when they say that science has nothing to do with the spiritual world. Certainly, it is not exactly appropriate to find followers among these people, who are, I would say, rigid monists, when one speaks the truth about these facts, but this truth is nevertheless true. It is not logical reasons, not anything that can be proven, that keep the soul captive in materialism or monism, but rather fear, which people do not recognize as fear, which they do not admit to themselves as fear. It conjures up ideas such as that it is unscientific to see the spiritual world. Those who see through things know that souls gather in materialist assemblies because fear of the spiritual world reigns in all of them. It is not pleasant to tell people that they are basically fearful souls, that they clothe this fear in a false logic, as if they could prove that only the facts of the physical world are valid.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":690,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p022","witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2024","book_title":"Death and Immortality in the Light of Spiritual Science","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA069d/English/SOL2024/19140508p01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 69d/1914-05-08/p022"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"high","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. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}],"witnesses":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"first_passage":1,"last_passage":54,"passage_count":54,"word_count":9939},{"lang":"en","edition":"English","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"first_passage":1,"last_passage":54,"passage_count":54,"word_count":10124,"completeness":{"ratio":1.02,"band":"comparable","note":null}}],"aligned_witness":{"status":"aligned","lang":"de","edition":"original","confidence":"high","passages":[{"locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p018","passage_number":18,"text":"In unbegrenzter Art muss die Tätigkeit der Aufmerksamkeit der Geistesforscher steigern, beziehungsweise derjenige, der ein Geistesforscher werden will. Während wir sonst doch durch äußere Veranlassung dazu kommen, unser Interesse für dieses oder jenes zu entwickeln, muss der Geistesforscher in innerlicher, kunstgerechter Weise Konzentration entwickeln. Willkürlich, durch starkes inneres Betätigen der Seelenkraft, muss der Geistesforscher alles, was in seiner Seele vorhanden ist, zusammenziehen und es möglichst auf etwas wenden, wozu er nicht von außen veranlasst ist, sei es auf Vorstellungen, die man in der Seele selbst bildet, sei es auf solche, die man sich von kundigen Geistesforschern raten lässt. Man lässt diese Vorstellungen willkürlich in bestimmten Momenten in seiner Seele aufsteigen; im Übrigen versucht man, sich in einen Zustand zu versetzen, dass die äußeren Sinne nichts wahrnehmen, wie im Schlafe, dass das gewöhnliche Denken stillsteht, wie im Schlafe, mit Ausnahme dessen, dass die ganze Seele mit allen Kräften gerichtet ist auf die einzige Vorstellung, die man festhält, so lange man kann. Das nennt man Konzentration. Das Nähere können Sie in den vorgenannten Büchern nachlesen. Es ist umso besser, je mehr man solche Vorstellungen verwendet, die gewissermaßen kein Vorbild in der äußeren Welt haben, je mehr man sinnbildliche Vorstellungen in den Mittelpunkt des Bewusstseins rückt. Und nun handelt es sich darum, dass der Geistesforscher diese Übung immer und immer wieder macht; der eine, je nach seinen Fähigkeiten, erreicht in kurzer Zeit etwas, der andere erst nach Jahren, aber so, wie es uns vorgesetzt ist, erreichen wir sozusagen — die Gegenwartsentwicklung der Menschheit macht das möglich -, die Fähigkeit, in der Seele etwas zu steigern, indem wir uns so verhalten. Kräfte, die sonst in der Seele wie in ihren Tiefen schlummern, werden die Oberfläche heraufgetragen, wenn wir immer wieder und wiederum in geduldiger, ausdauernder Anstrengung solche Übungen der Konzentration machen. Nicht auf äußere, tumultuarische Weise wird man ein Geistesforscher, sondern durch solche Vorgänge in der Seele, wie [sie] in der Aufmerksamkeitssteigerung ins Unbegrenzte geschildert [sind].","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":322,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p018"},{"locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p019","passage_number":19,"text":"Dann tritt in einem geeigneten Zeitpunkt etwas ein was man jetzt nennen kann - ich bemerke ausdrücklich dass auf den Ausdruck selbst kein besonderer Wert gelegt wird, dass damit nichts bewiesen werden soll —, man erlangt etwas, was man nennen kann einen «Vorgang der geistigen Chemie». Und indem ich diesen Vorgang der geistigen Chemie besprechen werde, werden Sie sehen, dass allerdings die moderne Geisteswissenschaft, wie sie hier gemeint ist, die wahre Wesenheit der Seele auf eine ähnlichen — aber nur auf einem ähnlichen — Wege sucht wie die Naturwissenschaft die Geheimnisse der Natur zu erlauschen versucht. Nur, weil die Geisteswissenschaft in das geistige Gebiet sich hineinbegibt, muss sie anders sein in ihren Methoden und Vorbereitungsarbeiten als die Naturwissenschaft.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":118,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p019"},{"locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p020","passage_number":20,"text":"Geistige Chemie! Nun, wenn wir den Ausdruck gebrauchen wollen als einen solchen, der uns die Sache begreiflich machen soll: Wenn man Wasser ansieht, so sieht man ihm nicht an, dass der Chemiker Wasserstoff von diesem Wasser abtrennen kann, denn Wasserstoff kann man im Wasser nicht sehen. Das Wasser löscht das Feuer, der Wasserstoff brennt. So wenig nun das Wesen des Wasserstoffes gesehen werden kann, wenn man das Wasser vor sich hat, so wenig kann im Menschen, der im Leibe vor uns steht, das Wesen der Seele gesehen werden. So aber, wie der Chemiker den Wasserstoff absondert von dem Wasser als etwas, was ganz andere Eigenschaften als das Wasser hat, so sondert der Geistesforscher, allerdings, indem er seine eigene Seele zum Werkzeug seiner Forschung macht, seine Seele ab von dem Leibe durch Konzentration, sein Geistig-Seelisches sondert er aus dem Physisch-Leiblichen heraus. Wenn eine abstrakte, nicht die Tatsachen berücksichtigende monistische Naturwissenschaft oder Weltanschauung das einen Dualismus nennt, kann man einen solchen Vorwurf ruhig ertragen. Ebenso gut könnte man sagen, im Wasser sei Dualismus; das Wasser ist nicht bloß eine Einheit, ein Monos, sondern damit man es kennenlernt, muss man herausziehen den Wasserstoff. So wie der Wasserstoff durch physische Chemie herausgehoben werden kann aus dem Wasser, so wird das Geistig-Seelische durch Vorgänge, wie der geschilderte einer ist - andere solche Vorgänge finden wir in den genannten Büchern -, so wird das Geistig-Seelische abgetrennt vom Physisch-Leiblichen. Und der Geistesforscher erlebt dann den bedeutsamen, den großen Augenblick, dass er wirklich mit den Worten einen Sinn verbinden kann, mit denen man, wenn man nichts weiß von den Tatsachen des geistigen Erlebens, keinen Sinn verbinden kann: Ich erlebe mich als seelisch-geistiges Wesen unabhängig von meinem Leibe außerhalb meines Leibes. - Und da ich nicht in Abstraktionen sprechen will, sondern von den Tatsachen des geistigen Erlebens, von den Tatsachen der Auffindung der wahren Wesenheit der Seele, will ich auch nicht damit zurückhalten, einzelne Erlebnisse, die der Geistesforscher durchmacht, zur Darstellung zu bringen.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":324,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p020"},{"locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p021","passage_number":21,"text":"Steht man im gewöhnlichen Leben darinnen, wo so, wie Wasserstoff an Sauerstoff, das Seelisch-Geistige an das Leibliche gebunden ist, dann, sehr verehrte Anwesende, dann sieht man die Welt so an, dass man weiß: Die Kraft deiner Seele entwickelst du durch die Werkzeuge deines Leibes; du bedienst dich deiner Sinne, deines Gehirns; du lebst in diesem deinem Leibe darinnen. — Das Erste, für welches man weiß, man lebe nach den angedeuteten Übungen mit seinem Seelisch-Geistigen außerhalb seines Leibes, das ist das, was man die Denkkraft nennen kann. Von dieser Denkkraft weiß man ja im gewöhnlichen Leben: Man kann sie dadurch gebrauchen, dass man mit dem Denken an das Gehirn gebunden ist. Nun aber erlebt man sich in Gedanken webend und seiend außerhalb seines Gehirns. Das ist kein Märchen, keine Hypothese, was ich Ihnen da erzähle, sondern es ist etwas, was derjenige erleben kann, der die betreffenden Übungen macht; er kommt dazu, zu wissen: Jetzt lebst du in deinem Gedankenleben wie dein eigenes Gehirn umschwebend; außerhalb des Leibes entwickelt sich die Kraft deines Denkens. - Namentlich den Moment erlebt man als besonders prägnant, man möchte sagen, als besonders erschütternd. Strengt man sich eine Zeit lang an, die Übungen zu machen, dann kommt die Zeit, wo man noch nicht recht erleben kann das Denken außerhalb des Gehirns. Es ist etwas, was eine wie traumhafte Dämmerung ausbreitet, als Erfolg der Konzentration; aber den Moment, wo man wiederum untertaucht in das Gehirn, wo das außer dem Leibe sich vollziehende Denken in das Denken im Leibe übergeht, den merkt man dann eigentlich zuerst ganz genau. Man fühlt, wie man mit dem Wesen, das man außerhalb seines Leibes erlebt hat, wiederum untertaucht, wie etwas, was man schwer durchdringt, und wie in wohligen Strömungen fühlt man sich mit seinem denkenden Wesen in seinen Leib einziehen und das Gehirn durchsetzen, um es wiederum zu gebrauchen zum äußeren Denken. Diese Tatsachen sind solche, dass man begreiflich findet, dass heute zahlreiche Menschen sagen müssen: Der redet Unsinn, der das sagt, das sind Phantastereien eines Halbwahnsinnigen. - Aber das sind die Tatsachen, durch die die Menschen erkennen werden, wie man das wahre Wesen der Seele erkennen lernt. Das sind Tatsachen, die sich verbreiten werden in der Kultur der Zukunft, denn die Seelen lechzen danach, wenn es ihnen auch noch nicht zum Bewusstsein kommt. Verbreiten werden sich diese Tatsachen ebenso, wie sich einst verbreitet hat die kopernikanische Weltanschauung, dass die Erde sich mit großer Geschwindigkeit durch den Weltenraum bewegt.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":406,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p021"},{"locus":"GA 69d/1914-05-08/p022","passage_number":22,"text":"Das Erste also, was man von dem physischen Leibe lostrennen kann, ist die Denkkraft, und man kann im Grunde genommen, wenn man Ausdauer hat, die beschriebenen Übungen länger fortzusetzen, diese Emanzipation vom physischen Denkorgan als erstes übersinnliches Erlebnis haben. Es handelt sich nur darum, dass man gewissermaßen einzelne Hindernisse überwinden muss, um solche Erlebnisse haben zu können. Menschen zum Beispiel, deren Interesse sich in dem erschöpft, was das physische Dasein allein ausmacht, die nicht weitherzige Interessen entwickeln können, die werden allerdings sehen, dass sich ihnen schwere Hindernisse entgegensetzen, wenn sie den Versuch wie eben geschildert machen. Weitherzigkeit der Interessen, Eingehen-Können auf dasjenige, was auch in der physischen Welt jedes Wesen schon an Schönheit, an Erhabenheit darbietet, de muss der Seele eignen. Wer nur für sich selbst sich interessiert, der wird merken, dass in demselben Maße, in dem er die Übungen macht - es kann sie ja jeder machen es handelt sich darum, dass er sie richtig macht -, wer so recht mit seinem gewöhnlichen Denken im Egoismus aufgeht, der wird schon merken, dass, indem er allerdings fortschreitet, durch die charakterisierten Übungen etwas über seine Seele kommt, was man nennen kann eine gewisse innere Furcht vor der Welt, die man betreten soll die man erlebt außer dem Leibe. Diese Furcht, die ist im Grunde genommen immer in der Seele vorhanden, nur weiß man nichts davon. Man spricht in der Geisteswissenschaft von der Schwelle, welche die sinnliche Welt von der geistigen, die irdische von der überirdischen trennt. Man spricht davon, dass man sie überschreiten muss, diese Schwelle, ja sogar davon spricht man, dass diese Schwelle bewacht wird durch einen Hüter, womit man selbstverständlich eine geistige Kraft meint. Das heißt: Wahr ist, und durch die Geisteswissenschaft wird es bewahrheitet, dass, wie Fichte sagt, die geistige Welt immer um uns herum ist und dass wir auch den Weg hinein finden können. Warum tritt diese geistige Welt nicht immer vor der Menschenseele auf wie die physische Welt? Weil dasjenige, was der angehende Geistesforscher durch Erlebnisse wie die eben geschilderten erleben kann, das Auftreten der Furcht in der Seele bewirkt, weil diese Furcht in der Seele ist; und diese Furcht ist ein gutes Heilmittel gegen ein unreifes Eindringen in die geistige Welt. Sie ist immer da, in den Seelen, diese Furcht, aber sie zeigt sich nicht als Furcht, sondern sie zeigt sich darin, dass die Menschen eben erlahmen in den Anstrengungen, die sie machen könnten, um in die geistige Welt hineinzukommen. Sie werden scheinbar lässig, es interessiert sie nicht mehr, die Übungen weiter zu machen; in Wahrheit aber ist es die Furcht, die sie nicht spüren, weil sie sie nicht als Furcht wahrnehmen. Sogar das kann man sagen, dass durch die Geistesforschung mit Sicherheit bewiesen wird, woher eigentlich die materialistische Gesinnung der Menschheit kommt. Es gibt ja in unserer Zeit materialistisch gesinnte Seelen, die da sagen, entweder, man könne nicht von einer geistigen Welt sprechen, oder, man solle sich nicht darum kümmern, weil das menschliche Erkenntnisvermögen nur auf die sinnliche Welt gerichtet sei. Sie sagen auch, es sei unwissenschaftlich, von einem Leben im Geiste zu sprechen. Ja, es dünken sich solche Menschen - man nennt sie heute vornehm «Monisten», früher sagte man «Materialisten» -, sie dünken sich ganz besonders wissenschaftlich, wenn sie die geistige Welt gänzlich ablehnen, wenn sie sagen, die Wissenschaft habe nichts zu tun mit der geistigen Welt. Gewiss, es ist nicht gerade geeignet, unter diesen Menschen Anhänger zu finden, die da, ich möchte sagen, Stockmonisten sind, wenn man die Wahrheit über diese Tatsachen ausspricht, aber diese Wahrheit ist doch eben wahr. Nicht logische Gründe, nicht irgendetwas, was man beweisen kann, halten die Seele im Materialismus oder Monismus gefangen, sondern die Furcht, die die Menschen nicht als Furcht erkennen, die sie sich nicht als Furcht gestehen. Sie treibt Vorstellungen herauf wie, es sei unwissenschaftlich, die geistige Welt einzusehen. Derjenige, der die Dinge durchschaut, weiß, dass in den Materialisten-Versammlungen die Seelen versammelt sind, weil in ihnen allen die Furcht vor der geistigen Welt waltet. Es ist nicht angenehm, den Menschen zu sagen, dass sie im Grunde genommen Angstseelen sind, dass sie diese Angst kleiden in eine Scheinlogik, als ob sie beweisen könnten, dass nur die Tatsachen der physischen Welt Berechtigung haben.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":696,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/69d/1914-05-08/p022"}],"beads":[{"from":[18],"to":[18],"confidence":"high","pairing_state":"verified"},{"from":[19],"to":[19],"confidence":"high","pairing_state":"verified"},{"from":[20],"to":[20],"confidence":"high","pairing_state":"verified"},{"from":[21],"to":[21],"confidence":"high","pairing_state":"verified"},{"from":[22],"to":[22],"confidence":"high","pairing_state":"verified"}],"note":"Paired by the paragraph aligner; each language numbers its own paragraphs. A bead at either end of the span can carry text beyond it (the `from` numbers show what each bead covers)."}}