The Rudolf Steiner Archive

7. Work in the Society

[ 1 ] In my lectures for the Anthroposophical Society, which I am currently giving at the Goetheanum, I seek to present the fundamental questions of human soul life. The five “guiding principles” that have been included in this newsletter so far characterize the point of view from which the presentation is given. I wanted to meet the basic requirement of an anthroposophical lecture. The listener should have the feeling that anthroposophy speaks of what he feels, in full self-reflection, to be a matter of his own soul. If the right way of presenting this can be found, then the members will develop the awareness that the Anthroposophical Society truly understands the human being.

[ 2 ] This is what drives people to become members. They want to find a place where human understanding is properly cultivated.

[ 3 ] One is actually already on the path to recognizing the spiritual nature of the world when one seriously seeks understanding of the human being. For in this search, one becomes aware that knowledge of nature does not provide any insights into the human being, but only raises questions.

[ 4 ] In anthroposophical descriptions, confusion only arises when one tries to lead the soul away from the love of nature. The starting point of anthroposophical consideration cannot lie in contempt for what nature reveals to human beings. Contempt for nature, turning away from the truth that shines forth to human beings in the phenomena of life and the world, from the beauty that reigns in these phenomena, from the tasks they set for human striving, can only lead to a distorted image of the spiritual being.

[ 5 ] Such a distorted image will always have a personal character. Even if it is not woven solely from dreams, it will still be experienced as dreaming. When people live with other people in their waking existence, their striving must be directed toward understanding what they have in common. What one person asserts must have meaning for another; what one person works out must have a certain value for another. People who live together must feel that they are in a shared world. When people weave in their dreams, they detach themselves from this shared world. Another person in their immediate vicinity may have completely different dreams. When awake, people share a common world; when dreaming, each has their own.

[ 6 ] Anthroposophy should not lead from wakefulness into dreaming, but into a stronger awakening. There is commonality in everyday life, but it is experienced within narrow limits. One is bound to a piece of existence; one carries the longing for a full life only in one's heart. One feels that the commonality of human experience extends beyond the sphere of everyday life. And just as one must look away from the earth toward the sun if one wants to perceive the source of light common to all earthly things, so one must turn away from the sensory world toward the content of the spirit if one wants to find what, out of genuine humanity, can lead the soul to a satisfying human community, to the full experience of this community.

[ 7 ] It is then easy to turn away from life instead of entering into it more intensely.

[ 8 ] And the despiser of nature is subject to this danger. He is driven into the loneliness of the soul, for which natural dreaming is a model. The best way to develop a sense of human truth, which is at the same time world truth, is to draw it closer to the truth that shines forth from the nature of the human soul. But those who experience natural truth with an open, free mind are led by it to spiritual truth. Those who allow themselves to be permeated by the beauty, grandeur, and sublimity of nature will find these qualities becoming a source of spiritual feeling. And those who open their hearts to the silent gestures of nature, which reveal themselves in eternal innocence beyond good and evil, will gain insight into the spiritual world, which makes the living word resound in the silent gestures, revealing the difference between good and evil.

[ 9 ] Spiritual contemplation that has passed through the love of nature contemplation enriches life with the true treasures of the soul; spiritual dreams that develop in contradiction to nature contemplation impoverish the human heart.

[ 10 ] Those who penetrate anthroposophy in its deepest essence will perceive what is indicated in these sentences as the point of view from which anthroposophical representations must proceed. Such starting points will touch upon what every member of the Anthroposophical Society says to themselves: this is what formed the true reason for my joining the Society.

[ 11 ] For members who want to be active in the Society, it will not be enough to be theoretically convinced of what is indicated here. Their conviction will only come to life when they develop a warm interest in everything that goes on in the Society. By experiencing what is conceived and experienced by the personalities in the Society, they will receive the warmth they need for their work in the Society. One must have a great deal of interest in other people if one wants to approach them in an anthroposophical way. The study of “what is happening in the society” must become the basis for working in the society. It is precisely those members who want to be active in the society who need this study.

Further Leading Thoughts issued from the Goetheanum for the Anthroposophical Society

[ 12 ] 6. When we look out on lifeless Nature, we find a world full of inner relationships of law and order. We seek for these relationships and find in them the content of the ‘Laws of Nature.’ We find, moreover, that by virtue of these Laws lifeless Nature forms a connected whole with the entire Earth. We may now pass from this earthly connection which rules in all lifeless things, to contemplate the living world of plants. We see how the Universe beyond the Earth sends in from distances of space the forces which draw the Living forth out of the womb of the Lifeless. In all living things we are made aware of an element of being, which, freeing itself from the mere earthly connection, makes manifest the forces that work down on to the Earth from realms of cosmic space. As in the eye we become aware of the luminous object which confronts it, so in the tiniest plant we are made aware of the nature of the Light from beyond the Earth. Through this ascent in contemplation, we can perceive the difference of the earthly and physical which holds sway in the lifeless world, from the extra-earthly and ethereal which abounds in all living things.

[ 13 ] 7. We find man with his transcendent being of soul and spirit placed into this world of the earthly and the extra earthly. Inasmuch as he is placed into the earthly connection which contains all lifeless things, he bears with him his physical body. Inasmuch as he unfolds within him the forces which the living world draws into this earthly sphere from cosmic space, he has an etheric or life-body. The trend of science in modern times has taken no account of this essential contrast of the earthly and the ethereal. For this very reason, science has given birth to the most impossible conceptions of the ether. For fear of losing their way in fanciful and nebulous ideas, scientists have refrained from dwelling on the real contrast. But unless we do so, we can attain no true insight into the Universe and Man.

Continued in the next issue.