The Christian Mystery
GA 97
17 February 1907, Leipzig
VIII. The Origins of Religious Confessions and Set Prayers
Humanity originally had an all-embracing basic approach which then took different forms depending on the character of nations and the climatic conditions in which they lived. Like the Lord's Prayer, all religious formulae and confessions contain the basic ideas of what is known in the spirit. Some may say these are mere dreams, but they are indeed present. How did they get there, however? Here we must understand that the things we are taught today were not presented in the same way in earliest times. The formulas of religious confessions differed greatly through the ages. The earliest views were in images, not concepts like those we have today. Those images were held on to, in a way, and we find them again and again. Thus insight is always referred to as a light, and wisdom as flowing water. But why was it that earlier peoples were spoken to in images? Let us try and understand how religious teachers would speak to the people before Hermes, before Buddha, Zarathustra and Moses and before the Christ as greatest founder of a religion.
We have to distinguish between everyday and image-based consciousness. We have our everyday object-bound conscious awareness from morning till night. We then see things the way they present themselves to the senses. The other levels of consciousness are hidden from us to begin with. We have all heard of the state of dreamless sleep. This means something very different to an initiate than it does to an ordinary person. The initiate is in a conscious state from going to sleep to waking up. He perceives a world, though in a very different way than one normally does. Ordinary people know nothing of this condition. The level of consciousness one has in dream-filled sleep is better known. We will therefore let dream-filled sleep serve to explain dreamless sleep to us.
Dream-filled sleep shows everything in symbols. It is similar to the state of consciousness an initiate has in the world of the spirit. The initiate also sees images, though these, too, are constantly changing. On the physical plane everything has just one form—a table, for example, or a stone. But the higher we go the more do forms keep changing. The plant changes and moves, the animal even more so, and human beings are most capable of change of all. In the devachan everything is continually changing. One can do certain exercises that will make the colour lift away from a plant one is observing, so that it floats and moves freely in space. One then has to learn to guide such free-floating colours and also sounds to particular objects and spirits. The colour then gives expression to the inner life. The human aura works like this in colour and form. Inner life experience comes to expression in it. But it is never at rest. It is eternal motion, eternal motion being the essence of the higher world. This is also what makes the world of the spirit so confusing to anyone entering into it for the first time. An inexperienced individual is confused by the fleeting manifestations. No entity endowed with spirit can hide its inner life from those who see with the eyes of the spirit. An ordinary person has to consider the outer aspect to draw conclusions as to the inner life. In the world of the spirit, the inner nature of every entity lies openly revealed. There we are united with the inmost nature of things. Today only initiates can have this; they are able to add the inner nature of things to their outer aspect. It is something they do in full conscious awareness. A long time ago, people were able to do this unconsciously.
The further back we go the less were people able to do the things we can do—they could not calculate, nor count. They knew nothing of logic. That is how it was around the middle of the Atlantean period. The Atlanteans could do something else instead, however. Looking at a plant, for example, they could feel a quite specific feeling arise in them. Our own feelings are pale and shadowy compared to theirs. The early Atlanteans did not yet have such definite ideas of colour as we have. They would see a colour rise like a mist from a plant and float freely. Nor would they have seen the colour of a crystal. They would, for instance, see a corona of colours around a ruby, with the ruby itself just a break in it. Even earlier, human beings would not even see the outlines of people, animals and plants. But if they approached an enemy they would see a form arise that was coloured a browny red. A beautiful bluish red would indicate a friend. They thus perceived the inner life in single shades of colour.
If we go even further back, to Lemurian times, all will impulses were also different. The will still had magic powers, showing its relationship to the powers of nature outside. When someone held his hand above a plant and let his will be active, it would immediately begin to grow. When man enclosed himself in a skin, his powers became more remote from those of nature.
Powers of thought are least like those of nature. Even earlier there were entities that would have considered it a monstrous thing to say: ‘I form an idea of something outside me.’ They would see the idea at work outside as an entity. Originally things made up ideas. Today we look at a watch and get an idea of it. But we would not be able to form the ‘watch’ idea if someone had not at one time formed the idea before there were any watches and then made a watch. It is the same with the ideas for all things. The ideas we have about the things in the world were realities in the far distant past. At that time they were put into the things. Everything arises according to such ideas, which is what people still do today when they are creative. The spirits that existed at the time were watching the master mechanic of things, as it were. They had a creative intellect. They were not yet incarnated in the flesh. The principle which dwells in the human body today was still in the keeping of the godhead at that time. Physical life already existed down below on earth, with life forms that were between today's animals and humans and were ready to receive the human soul. We can use a metaphor for this. If many tiny sponges are dipped in water, each will absorb droplets of water, and so the water is divided up into lots of single drops. The physical earth with its teeming throng of creatures was surrounded by spirit then where it is surrounded by air today. Individual souls only came into being when each had absorbed a droplet of the spirit. This also started the process in which man developed a separate object-related conscious mind.
Before that, the soul received everything as though from within from the cosmic soul, for the cosmic soul knew everything. That is the difference between knowledge now and knowledge then. The inner world goes down into the darkness of dreamless sleep when bright daytime consciousness arises. It is the astral body which perceives the outside world, seeing colours, hearing sounds, feeling pleasure and pain, but it cannot do this without the physical body. The astral body is the same as the one that once was part of common soul substance. If everyone were to go to sleep at the same moment and their astral bodies would be all mixed up, with the part of the general world soul that has not entered into individual bodies also mixed in, dreamless sleep would end, colours and sounds would arise in the astral bodies the way it was in the past when all souls still rested in the cosmic soul. Night, as we know it today, was then filled with light, filled with perceptions made in the world of the spirit. The whole of humanity once had this kind of astral perception.
What has humanity been perceiving since then? What has man gained for himself since? His self-awareness, the ability to say ‘I’ to himself. The whole of that earlier consciousness was only an enhanced dream consciousness, and people had no self-awareness. self-awareness was given to human beings when they descended into the body. And this is on the increase all the time. It is the content of present human evolution. ‘I am the I am’ has revealed itself to humanity. That is the true name of Jahveh,90Exodus 3: 14 or, more fully: ‘I am he who is, was and shall be.’ In those far distant times human beings had no awareness of this. Where did an ‘I am’ awareness exist then? In the spirit who had all the souls in it like drops in water. The holy spirit is the one who had I-consciousness before there was embodiment. It is the spirit as such which comes to I-awareness in human beings.
In that remote past, teaching was a pouring out of wisdom which came from inside, not outside. Between that time and our own there was an intermediate period, the Atlantean age. When this was at its mid-stage, human beings were able to see outlines of objects and life forms. But everything was still enveloped in a mist of colours for them, with sounds alive in it that had something to say, that were wise. A teaching then developed that later became religious teaching as we know it. Aeons of time ago91One of the sets of notes on the lecture has ‘about 200 000 years ago’. they had a great school for adepts. Everything we learn today comes from those Turanian adepts.92Turan was the name of the realm beyond the Amu Daria (formerly Oxus) river in Central Asia. Pupils passed it on right to the present day. But people taught in a different way in those times. It had to be taken into account that humanity was in an in-between stage. Even the wisest men could not have counted up to five. But by reacting to their inner reality it was possible to illuminate them, teach them wisdom in images. They could not have been given the wisdom in words, for those would not have been understood. Human beings did not have the bright daytime consciousness that we have today. On the other hand it was easy to put them in a state where the godhead illumined them from inside. The teachers would put the pupils into a hypnotic state. This would not have been the hypnotic state used to cause so much mischief today, but it was similar. The teachers would use this sleep state to illuminate the pupils.
They had occult writing at that time, something we might also call occult language. We still have mantras that rank higher in value than thoughts. They are mere shadows, however, compared to the sound compositions of those early times. These were simple, but when a note was sounded, the lost capacity for illumination would be restored. The world of inner illumination then came to people artificially and they would see the cosmic spirits at work as in earlier times. The pupil would receive formulas and specific drawings from the teachers. This would give direct perception of cosmic secrets. This sign, for instance, would tell him how a new plant grows from a seed (Fig. 3).
Today people need to have this explained if they are to think or feel anything as they see it. In those days, the sign had an immediate effect on those who saw it or heard the beat of it. The founders of religions taught the formulas used in those times to the people of later ages.
The further we go back, the more was the cosmic soul still all one. In sleep, the astral bodies of all human beings are still fairly alike. In Atlantis the astral bodies were all alike in this way. It was then possible to give one original wisdom to all people. When the great flood had passed over Atlantean humanity, wisdom could no longer be the same for all. It was then necessary to teach in India the way the Indian body needed it, and differently in Persia and again in Egypt, differently for the Greeks and Romans, and do it differently again for the ancient Germans. But the origins live on in all true forms of religion. In Atlantis, illumination was to have life conveyed to one, not to be taught. The sign of the vortex would arouse an immediate inner response. Today our feelings need concepts to catch fire. The seven petitions of the Lord's Prayer would in the past have been presented like a scale of seven notes, connected with seven particular colours and smells.
The Atlantean pupil thus came to have living experience of the sevenfold nature of man. The Christ, the greatest of the religious teachers, put this into the Lord's Prayer. The power of the Lord's prayer is given to everyone who says it. It is not an actual mantra, though it may have mantric powers. It is a thought-mantra. It did of course have its greatest power in the original language, but because it is a thought-mantra it will not lose its power even if it is translated into a thousand languages. Just as we are able to digest food without knowing the laws that govern digestion, so we may have the benefit of the Lord's Prayer even if we do not have higher knowledge. Someone with higher knowledge will, of course, have even greater benefit of it.
That is the route which has been followed by religious truths. All our souls were somnambulant once in the cosmic soul. This then became differentiated and was drawn down into many bodies. Spiritual perception became obscured, as did the possibility of restoring people to the original state. The religious teachings, and especially the formulas taken from the world of the spirit are only an echo, being now in concepts and words. The wisdom of the Old Testament still speaks of primal ideas and ideas. A faint reflection of primal ideas lives on in ideas. But that original wisdom has not been lost. It still rests in our dormant souls. It is the task of the science of the spirit to bring it to clear conscious awareness. When man will have knowledge of the whole of the outside world after his last incarnation, he is received into the original clairvoyance and brings new illumination, clairvoyant consciousness with him. In the East, it is said that redemption is gained by giving oneself up to universal consciousness. But it will not be like that. Once, before man's first embodiment, there was no self-awareness. But it will be there after the last incarnation. Every drop of soul fluid takes on a specific colour, each a different one. Every one will in the end bring its own colour, and the water, formerly bright and clear, will shimmer in infinitely beautiful, luminous colours, each of which will be separate, however. Everyone brings his own colour, his individual conscious awareness that can never be lost. Universal consciousness will ultimately be all conscious awarenesses in harmony. The many will be one of their own free accord! We have to imagine this in its true nature. Every individual consciousness is then wholly within the universal consciousness.
This human evolution has its purpose. Yes, life has meaning, and the most beautiful meaning is that in the end the human being will lay down a piece of human existence on the altar of the godhead that he has gained for himself And from this the garment will be woven which the Earth Spirit is spinning, as Goethe put it so beautifully and in such rousing terms:
In flooding life and storm of activity
up and down I flow,
moving to and fro!
Birth and the grave,
an eternal sea,
going one way and t' other,
a burning life
thus I work at the roaring loom of time
making the godhead's living garb.93Goethe, Faust 1, 4: 501-9.
Der Ursprung der Religionsbekenntnisse und Gebetsformeln
Von einer allumfassenden Grundanschauung ging die Menschheit aus, und je nach den Charakteren der Völker, nach den klimatischen Verhältnissen, in denen sie lebten, prägte sich diese in den Religionsbekenntnissen verschieden aus. Wie im Vaterunser, so treten uns in allen andern religiösen Formeln und Bekenntnissen die geisteswissenschaftlichen Grundbegriffe entgegen. Mag auch mancher sagen, sie seien bloß hineingeträumt, sie sind tatsächlich darin enthalten. Aber wie kommen sie hinein? Dazu müssen wir uns klarmachen, daß das, was uns heute gelehrt wird, in den ältesten Anschauungen nicht etwa in derselben Art vorgetragen wurde. Die Formeln der religiösen Bekenntnisse waren zu verschiedenen Zeiten sehr verschieden. Die älteren. Anschauungen sprechen in Bildern, nicht in Begriffen, wie wir es heute tun. Diese Bilder wurden in gewisser Weise beibehalten, und wir finden sie wieder und wieder. So wird stets von der Erkenntnis als einem Licht geredet, und von der Weisheit spricht man als vom flutenden Wasser. Wie kommt es aber, daß zu den älteren Völkern in Bildern gesprochen wurde? Wir wollen uns einmal klarmachen, wie vor Hermes, vor Buddha, Zarathustra und Moses, wie vor dem größten Religionsstifter, vor Christus, die Religionslehrer zu den Völkern sprachen.
Zwischen dem alltäglichen und dem imaginativen Bewußtsein müssen wir unterscheiden. Das gegenständliche, alltägliche Bewußtsein haben wir von morgens bis abends. Da sehen wir die Dinge so, wie sie sich unseren Sinnen zeigen. Die andern Bewußtseinszustände sind uns zunächst verborgen. Wir haben alle von dem Zustande des traumlosen Schlafes gehört. Der hat für den Eingeweihten eine ganz andere Bedeutung als für die gewöhnlichen Menschen. Vom Einschlafen bis zum Aufwachen ist der Eingeweihte in einem bewußten Zustande. Er nimmt eine Welt wahr, wenn auch anders, in ganz anderer Art als sonst. Der gewöhnliche Mensch weiß nichts von diesem Zustand. Das Bewußtsein des traumerfüllten Schlafes kennt man schon eher. So soll uns nun der traumerfüllte Schlaf den traumlosen erklären.
Der traumerfüllte Schlaf zeigt alles in Sinnbildern. Er ist ähnlich dem Bewußittseinszustand des Eingeweihten, wenn er in der geistigen Welt ist. Bilder sieht auch der Eingeweihte, aber nicht chaotische Traumbilder, obwohl sich auch seine Bilder fortwährend verwandeln. Auf dem physischen Plane hat jedes Ding nur eine Form, zum Beispiel ein Tisch, ein Stein. Aber je höher wir steigen, um so mehr ist die Form in der Verwandlung begriffen. Es verwandelt und regt sich die Pflanze, mehr noch das Tier, am beweglichsten und verwandlungsfähigsten ist der Mensch. Im Devachan ist alles fortwährend in der Verwandlung begriffen. Durch bestimmte Übungen kann man es erreichen, daß, wenn man eine Pflanze betrachtet, sich die Farbe von ihr abhebt und im freien Raume auf und ab schwebt. Dann muß man lernen, solche freischwebenden Farben und auch Töne zu bestimmten Dingen und Wesenheiten hinleiten zu können. Dann wird die Farbe ein Ausdruck des Innenlebens. So wirkt ja auch die Aura des Menschen in Farbe und Form. Inneres seelisches Erleben drückt sich in ihr aus. Auch sie ist niemals still. Eine ewige Bewegung ist sie, eine ewige Bewegung ist das Wesentliche der höheren Welt. Das ist auch das Verwirrende der geistigen Welt für den, der sie zum ersten Male betritt. Es verwirrt den Unerfahrenen das, was sich augenblickgemäfß manifestiert. Vor denen, die mit geistigen Augen schauen, kann kein geistiges Wesen sein Seelenleben verbergen. Der gewöhnliche Mensch muß aus dem Äußeren aufs Innere schließen. Frei und offen liegt in der geistigen Welt das Innere jedes Wesens da. Wir sind da mit dem innersten Wesen der Dinge zusammen. Dies kann sich jetzt nur der Eingeweihte verschaffen, der das Innere der Dinge zum Äußeren hinzufügen kann. Und zwar tut er dies bewußt. Unbewußt konnten dies einst die Menschen vor langer Zeit. Je älter die Menschen sind, desto weniger können sie das, was wir können: sie können nicht rechnen, nicht zählen. Von Logik wissen sie nichts. So war es in der Mitte der atlantischen Zeit. Dafür konnten die Atlantier aber etwas anderes. Sie konnten ein ganz bestimmtes Gefühl in sich aufsteigen fühlen, wenn sie zum Beispiel eine Pflanze betrachteten. Blaß und schattenhaft sind unsere Gefühle dagegen. Die ersten Atlantier hatten noch nicht so deutliche Farbenvorstellungen wie wir. Wie Nebel sah der Atlantier die Farbe frei schwebend von der Pflanze aufsteigen. Auch die Farbe eines Kristalls hätte er nicht gesehen. Einen Strahlenkranz von Farben sah er zum Beispiel um einen Rubin herum, den Rubin selbst nur als Einschnitt darin. Vor dieser Zeit sah der Mensch noch nicht einmal die Umrisse von Menschen, Tieren und Pflanzen. Aber wenn er sich einem Feinde näherte, so sah er ein Gebilde von bräunlich-rötlicher Färbung aufsteigen. Eine schöne bläulich-rötliche Färbung zeigte ihm den Freund. So nahm er das Innenleben in einzelnen Farben wahr.
Wenn wir noch weiter zurückgehen, in die lemurische Zeit, so waren da sogar alle Willensimpulse anders. Der Wille wirkte noch ‚ magisch, er zeigte seine Verwandtschaft mit den Naturkräften draußen. Legte damals ein Mensch die Hand über eine Pflanze und ließ dabei seinen Willen wirken, so wuchs sie zusehends. Dadurch, daß der Mensch sich in eine Haut abschloß, entfernten sich seine Kräfte von den Kräften der Natur.
Der Natur am unähnlichsten sind die Denkkräfte. Noch weiter zurück gab es Wesen, die es für ein Unding gehalten hätten, zu sagen: Ich fasse einen Begriff von einem Außending. - Denn sie sahen ja den Begriff draußen, arbeitend, als Wesenheit. Die Begriffe bildeten ursprünglich die Dinge. Heute betrachten wir eine Uhr und bilden uns einen Begriff davon. Aber wir könnten uns den Begriff «Uhr» nicht bilden, wenn nicht einmal jemand diesen Begriff, bevor es Uhren gab, gebildet und danach eine Uhr konstruiert hätte. Geradeso ist es mit den Begriffen aller Dinge. Die Begriffe, die wir uns über die Dinge der Welt bilden, existierten als Wirklichkeiten in urferner Vergangenheit. Damals wurden sie in die Dinge hineingelegt. Alles entsteht nach solchen Begriffen, wie es die Menschen mit ihren Schöpfungen heute auch machen. Jene Wesen von damals haben gleichsam dem Werkmeister der Dinge zugeschaut. Sie hatten einen schöpferischen Intellekt. Im fleischlichen Leibe waren sie noch nicht verkörpert. Was heute im menschlichen Leibe wohnt, ruhte damals noch im Schoße der Gottheit. Unten auf der Erde gab es schon ein physisches Leben und Wesen, die zwischen dem heutigen Tier und Menschen standen und reif waren, die menschliche Seele zu empfangen. Man kann sich das unter einem Bilde vorstellen. Wenn viele Schwämmchen in Wasser getaucht werden, so wird jedes Schwämmchen Wassertröpfchen aufsaugen, und so wird dann das Wasser in lauter einzelne Tropfen geteilt. Die physische Erde mit ihrem Gewimmel von Wesen war damals von einer geistigen Hülle umgeben, wie wir heute von einer Lufthülle. Da entstanden erst die einzelnen Seelen, als jedes Wesen ein geistiges Tröpfchen aufgesogen hatte. Damit war auch der Prozeß eingeleitet, wodurch der Mensch ein abgeschlossenes, gegenständliches Bewußtsein erhält.
Vorher empfing die Seele von der Weltseele wie von innen heraus alles, denn die Weltseele wußte ja alles. Das ist der Unterschied zwischen heutigem und damaligem Wissen. Die innere Welt sinkt ins Dunkel des traumlosen Schlafes herab, wenn das helle Tagesbewußtsein eintritt. Der astralische Leib ist es, der die Außenwelt wahrnimmt: er sieht Farben, hört Töne, empfindet Lust und Schmerz, aber er kann dies nicht ohne den physischen Leib. Der astralische Leib ist auch derselbe wie der, der einst in der gemeinschaftlichen Seelensubstanz war. Wenn alle Menschen zugleich einschlafen würden und ihre Astralleiber würden vermischt und auch mit dem vermischt, was sich von der allgemeinen Weltseele nicht in einzelne Leiber herabsenkte, dann würde der traumlose Schlaf aufhören, Farben und Töne würden in den Astralleibern aufsteigen, geradeso wie es ehemals war, als alle Seelen noch in der Weltseele ruhten. Was heute Nacht ist, das war einst lichterfüllt, erfüllt von Wahrnehmungen in der geistigen Welt. So hat einst die ganze Menschheit astral wahrgenommen.
Was hat die Menschheit seit jener Zeit wahrgenommen? Was hat der Mensch sich seither erobert? Sein Ich-Bewußtsein, die Möglichkeit, zu sich «Ich» zu sagen. Das ganze ältere Bewußtsein war nur ein gesteigertes Traumbewußtsein, die Menschen waren nicht selbstbewußt. Das Selbstbewußtsein ward den Menschen beim Heruntersteigen in den Leib geschenkt. Und das steigert sich mehr und mehr. Es bildet den Inhalt der jetzigen Menschheitsentwickelung. «Ich bin der Ich-bin», hat sich den Menschen offenbart. Das ist der wahre Name Jahves: «Ich bin der Ich-bin», oder länger ausgedrückt: «Ich bin, der da war, der da ist und der da sein wird.» In jener urfernen Vergangenheit war beim Menschen dies Bewußtsein nicht vorhanden. Wo war da ein «Ich-bin»-Bewußtsein? In dem Wesen, in dem die Seelen enthalten waren wie Tropfen im Wasser. Der Heilige Geist ist der, der oben vor der Einkörperung das Ich-Bewußtsein hatte. Der Geist an sich ist das, was im Menschen zum Ich-Bewußtsein kommt.
In jener urfernen Vergangenheit war das Lehren ein Ausgießen der Weisheit: sie kam von innen, nicht von außen. Von jener Zeit bis zu uns gab es eine Zwischenzeit, die atlantische Zeit. In ihrer Mitte war es, da sahen die Menschen schon Umrisse von den Dingen und Wesen. Doch war ihnen alles noch in einen Farbennebel eingehüllt und von Tönen durchklungen, die etwas zu sagen hatten, die weise waren. Damals entstand eine Lehre, die sich zur späteren religiösen Lehre fortentwickelte. Vor ungeheuren Zeiträumen gab es dort eine große Adeptenschule. Alles, was wir heute lernen, stammt von jenen, den turanischen Adepten. Es ward durch Schüler fortgepflanzt bis auf den heutigen Tag. Damals aber lehrte man ganz anders als heute. Man mußte darauf Rücksicht nehmen, daß die Menschheit sich in einem Zwischenzustand befand. Bis fünf hätten die weisesten Männer nicht zählen können. Aber man konnte, wenn man auf ihr Inneres reagierte, sie erleuchten, bildlich ihnen Weisheit beibringen. Sagen hätte man ihnen die Weisheitslehren nicht können, man wäre nicht verstanden worden. Die Menschen von damals hatten noch kein so helles Tagesbewußittsein wie wir heute. Dafür aber konnten sie leicht wieder in jenen Zustand versetzt werden, in dem die Gottheit sie von innen erleuchtete. Die Lehrer brachten die Schüler in einen Zustand der Hypnose. Das war aber nicht der hypnotische Zustand, mit dem heute so viel Unfug getrieben wird, aber etwas Ähnliches. Diesen Schlafzustand benutzten die Lehrer, um die Schüler zu erleuchten. Damals hatte man die okkulte Schrift, das, was man auch okkulte Sprache nennen kann. Es gibt noch Mantren, die mehr als Gedankenwert haben. Diese sind aber schattenhaft gegenüber den Tonzusammenstellungen von damals. Einfach waren diese Tonzusammenstellungen, aber wenn ein Ton angeschlagen wurde, so war die verlorene Erleuchtungsfähigkeit ersetzt. Da kam dann jene Welt innerer Erleuchtung künstlich in den Menschen hinein, er sah die Weltgeister am Werke so wie einst. Von den Lehrern empfing dann der Schüler Formeln und bestimmte Zeichnungen. Die Weltengeheimnisse nahm er dann unmittelbar wahr. Zum Beispiel wie aus einem Samenkorn eine neue Pflanze wird, sagte ihm dieses Zeichen:
Der heutige Mensch kann sich ohne Auslegung nichts dabei denken, nichts dabei fühlen. Auf die Menschen der damaligen Zeit wirkte dies Zeichen unmittelbar, wenn sie es sahen, oder wenn es abgeklopft wurde. Die Formeln, die damals Anwendung fanden, lehrten dann die Religionsstifter den späteren Völkern.
Je weiter wir zurückgehen, um so einheitlicher war die Weltseele noch. Im Schlaf sind die Astralleiber aller Menschen einander noch ziemlich ähnlich. So waren damals in Atlantis die Astralleiber alle einander gleich. Da konnte man allen Menschen eine Urweisheit bringen. Nachdem die gewaltige Flut über die atlantische Menschheit hingegangen war, war keine einheitliche Weisheit mehr möglich. Jetzt mußte man in Indien so lehren, wie es der indische Leib verlangte, und wieder anders in Persien, anders in Ägypten, anders bei den Griechen und Römern und wieder anders bei den alten Germanen. Aber in allen wirklichen Religionsformen lebt das fort, woraus sie entstanden sind. In Atlantis war die Erleuchtung Mitteilung von Leben, nicht von Lehre. Das Zeichen des Wirbels erweckte ja unmittelbar Empfindung. Heute müssen die Gefühle sich erst an Begriffen entzunden. Auch die sieben Bitten des Vaterunser wurden einst so mitgeteilt wie eine Tonskala in sieben Tönen, verbunden mit bestimmten sieben Farben und Gerüchen.
So erlebte der atlantische Schüler die siebengliedrige Wesenheit des Menschen. Das goß der größte der Religionslehrer, Christus, in das Vaterunser. Die Wirkung des Vaterunsers hat jeder, der es betet. Es ist kein eigentliches Mantram, obwohl es mantrische Kräfte haben kann. Es ist ein Gedankenmantram. Freilich hatte es in der Ursprache die größte Gewalt. Aber da es eben ein Gedankenmantram ist, so wird es seine Kraft nicht verlieren, und wenn man es in tausend Sprachen übersetzt. Wie man verdauen kann, ohne die Verdauungsgesetze zu kennen, so hat man die Frucht des Vaterunsers auch ohne Erkenntnis, wenn auch der Höherwissende noch eine ganz andere Frucht davon hat.
Solchen Weg machten die religiösen Wahrheiten. Alle unsere Seelen waren einst somnambul in der Weltenseele. Sie ward gegliedert und herabgezogen in viele Leiber. Die geistige Wahrnehmung ward verdunkelt, auch die Möglichkeit, den Urzustand wieder hervorzurufen. Nur ein Nachklang in Begriffen und Worten sind die religiösen Lehren, und namentlich die Formeln, die aus der geistigen Welt geholt wurden. Von Urideen und Ideen spricht noch die Weisheit des Alten Testamentes. In den Ideen lebt ein schwacher Abglanz der Urideen. Aber jene Urweisheit ist nicht verloren. Sie ruht noch in unseren schlummernden Seelen. Und das ins hellklare Bewußtsein heraufzuheben, ist die Arbeit der Geisteswissenschaft. Wenn der Mensch nach der letzten Inkarnation die ganze Außenwelt kennengelernt haben wird, dann wird er in die ursprüngliche Hellsichtigkeit aufgenommen und bringt neue Erleuchtung, Hellbewußtsein mit. Aufgehen im Allbewußtsein sei Erlösung -, sagt man im Osten. So wird es nicht sein. Ehemals, vor der ersten Einkörperung, war kein Ich-Bewußtsein da. Es wird aber nach der letzten Inkarnation da sein. Jeder Tropfen der einen Seelenflüssigkeit färbt sich mit einer ganz bestimmten Farbe, jeder mit einer andern. Jeder bringt am Ende seine Farbe mit, und das ehemals helle, klare Wasser wird schillernd von unendlich schönen, leuchtenden Farben, die aber jede für sich da sind. Jeder bringt seine bestimmte Farbe mit, sein individuelles Bewußtsein, das unverlierbar ist. Harmonie aller Bewußtseine ist das Allbewußtsein zuletzt. In Freiheit werden die vielen, weil sie so wollen, eine Einheit sein! Wir müssen uns das vorstellen, wie es wirklich ist. Jedes Einzelbewußtsein ist ganz im Allbewußtsein enthalten.
Diese Entwickelung der Menschheit ist nicht umsonst. Ja, das Leben hat einen Sinn, und der schönste Sinn ist, daß der Mensch zuletzt am Altar der Gottheit das Stück Menschendasein niederlegen wird, was er selbst erworben hat. Und daraus wird gewoben das Gewand, das der Erdgeist spinnt, wie Goethe so schön und erhebend sagt:
In Lebensfluten, im Tatensturm
Wall’ ich auf und ab,
Webe hin und her!
Geburt und Grab,
Ein ewiges Meer,
Ein wechselnd Weben,
Ein glühend Leben,
So schaff’ ich am sausenden Webstuhl der Zeit,
Und wirke der Gottheit lebendiges Kleid.
The Origin of Religious Creeds and Prayer Formulas
Humanity started out with an all-encompassing basic view of the world, and depending on the character of the peoples and the climatic conditions in which they lived, this view was expressed in different ways in their religious creeds. As in the Lord's Prayer, the basic concepts of spiritual science are found in all other religious formulas and creeds. Although some may say that they are merely dreamed up, they are actually contained therein. But how did they get there? To answer this question, we must realize that what we are taught today was not presented in the same way in the oldest beliefs. The formulas of religious creeds were very different at different times. The older views speak in images, not in concepts, as we do today. These images have been retained in a certain way, and we find them again and again. Thus, knowledge is always spoken of as a light, and wisdom is spoken of as flowing water. But how is it that the older peoples spoke in images? Let us first clarify how, before Hermes, before Buddha, Zarathustra, and Moses, before the greatest founder of religion, before Christ, the religious teachers spoke to the peoples.
We must distinguish between everyday consciousness and imaginative consciousness. We have objective, everyday consciousness from morning to night. We see things as they appear to our senses. The other states of consciousness are initially hidden from us. We have all heard of the state of dreamless sleep. For the initiate, this has a completely different meaning than for ordinary people. From falling asleep to waking up, the initiate is in a conscious state. He perceives a world, albeit differently, in a completely different way than usual. Ordinary people know nothing about this state. The consciousness of dream-filled sleep is more familiar. So let dream-filled sleep explain dreamless sleep to us.
Dream-filled sleep shows everything in symbols. It is similar to the state of consciousness of the initiate when he is in the spiritual world. The initiate also sees images, but not chaotic dream images, although his images are also constantly changing. On the physical plane, every thing has only one form, for example, a table or a stone. But the higher we ascend, the more the form is in the process of transformation. Plants transform and move, animals even more so, and humans are the most mobile and transformable of all. In Devachan, everything is constantly undergoing transformation. Through certain exercises, it is possible to achieve a state where, when looking at a plant, its color stands out and floats up and down in free space. Then one must learn to be able to direct such freely floating colors and also sounds toward certain things and beings. Then the color becomes an expression of inner life. This is how the human aura also works in color and form. Inner spiritual experience is expressed in it. It, too, is never still. It is eternal movement; eternal movement is the essence of the higher world. This is also what is confusing about the spiritual world for those who enter it for the first time. What manifests itself moment by moment confuses the inexperienced. No spiritual being can hide its soul life from those who see with spiritual eyes. Ordinary people must infer the inner from the outer. In the spiritual world, the inner life of every being lies freely and openly before us. There we are together with the innermost essence of things. Only the initiate, who can add the inner to the outer, can now attain this. And they do this consciously. Long ago, people were able to do this unconsciously. The older people are, the less they can do what we can do: they cannot calculate or count. They know nothing about logic. This was the case in the middle of the Atlantean period. But the Atlanteans could do something else. They could feel a very specific feeling rising within them when they looked at a plant, for example. Our feelings, on the other hand, are pale and shadowy. The first Atlanteans did not yet have such clear ideas of color as we do. Like mist, the Atlantean saw color rising freely from the plant. Nor would he have seen the color of a crystal. For example, he saw a halo of colors around a ruby, the ruby itself only as an incision in it. Before this time, humans did not even see the outlines of people, animals, and plants. But when they approached an enemy, they saw a brownish-reddish shape rising up. A beautiful bluish-reddish color showed them their friends. In this way, they perceived inner life in individual colors.
If we go back even further, to the Lemurian period, even all impulses of will were different. The will still had a ‘magical’ effect; it showed its kinship with the forces of nature outside. If a human being placed their hand on a plant at that time and let their will take effect, it grew visibly. By enclosing themselves in skin, humans distanced their powers from the forces of nature.
The powers of thought are most dissimilar to nature. Even further back, there were beings who would have considered it absurd to say: I grasp a concept of an external thing. For they saw the concept outside, working, as a being. Concepts originally formed things. Today, we look at a clock and form a concept of it. But we could not form the concept of a “clock” if someone had not first formed this concept before clocks existed and then constructed a clock. It is the same with the concepts of all things. The concepts we form about the things of the world existed as realities in the distant past. At that time, they were placed into things. Everything comes into being according to such concepts, just as people do today with their creations. Those beings of that time watched, as it were, the master craftsman of things. They had a creative intellect. They were not yet embodied in physical bodies. What dwells in the human body today still rested in the bosom of the deity at that time. Down on earth, there was already physical life and beings that stood between today's animals and humans and were ready to receive the human soul. You can imagine this with an image. When many small sponges are dipped in water, each sponge will absorb water droplets, and thus the water is divided into many individual drops. The physical earth, with its teeming swarms of beings, was then surrounded by a spiritual envelope, as we are today by an envelope of air. The individual souls only came into being when each being had absorbed a spiritual drop. This also initiated the process by which human beings acquire a complete, objective consciousness.
Before that, the soul received everything from the world soul as if from within, for the world soul knew everything. That is the difference between knowledge today and knowledge then. The inner world sinks into the darkness of dreamless sleep when the bright consciousness of day enters. It is the astral body that perceives the outside world: it sees colors, hears sounds, feels pleasure and pain, but it cannot do this without the physical body. The astral body is also the same as the one that was once in the communal soul substance. If all human beings fell asleep at the same time and their astral bodies were mixed together and also mixed with that which did not descend from the general world soul into individual bodies, then dreamless sleep would cease, colors and sounds would rise in the astral bodies, just as it was in former times when all souls still rested in the world soul. What is dark tonight was once filled with light, filled with perceptions in the spiritual world. This is how all of humanity once perceived astral reality.
What has humanity perceived since that time? What has man conquered since then? His self-consciousness, the ability to say “I” to himself. The entire older consciousness was only an heightened dream consciousness; people were not self-conscious. Self-consciousness was given to people when they descended into the body. And it increases more and more. It forms the content of the current development of humanity. “I am that I am” has been revealed to humans. That is the true name of Yahweh: “I am that I am,” or, expressed more fully: “I am who was, who is, and who will be.” In that distant past, humans did not have this consciousness. Where was there an “I am” consciousness? In the being in which souls were contained like drops in water. The Holy Spirit is the one who had the I-consciousness above before incarnation. The Spirit itself is what becomes I-consciousness in human beings.
In that distant past, teaching was an outpouring of wisdom: it came from within, not from without. Between that time and our own there was an intervening period, the Atlantean era. In its midst, people already saw outlines of things and beings. But everything was still shrouded in a mist of colors and filled with sounds that had something to say, that were wise. At that time, a teaching arose that later developed into religious doctrine. A long time ago, there was a great school of adepts. Everything we learn today comes from those Turanian adepts. It has been passed down by students to the present day. At that time, however, teaching was very different from today. One had to take into account that humanity was in an intermediate state. The wisest men could not count beyond five. But if one responded to their inner being, one could enlighten them, teach them wisdom figuratively. One could not have told them the wisdom teachings, one would not have been understood. The people of that time did not yet have such clear daytime consciousness as we have today. But they could easily be put back into that state in which the deity enlightened them from within. The teachers brought the students into a state of hypnosis. This was not the hypnotic state that is used for so much mischief today, but something similar. The teachers used this state of sleep to enlighten the students. At that time, there were occult writings, which could also be called occult language. There are still mantras that are more than just food for thought. However, these are shadow-like compared to the sound compositions of that time. These sound compositions were simple, but when a sound was struck, the lost ability to enlighten was replaced. Then that world of inner enlightenment came artificially into the human being, and he saw the world spirits at work as they once were. The teacher then gave the student formulas and certain drawings. The student then perceived the secrets of the world directly. For example, how a seed becomes a new plant was revealed to him by this sign:
Today's human beings cannot understand or feel anything without interpretation. This symbol had an immediate effect on the people of that time when they saw it or when it was tapped. The formulas that were used at that time were then taught by the founders of religions to later peoples.
The further back we go, the more unified the world soul was. In sleep, the astral bodies of all people are still quite similar to each other. In Atlantis, for example, the astral bodies were all the same. It was possible to bring primal wisdom to all people. After the great flood had swept over the Atlantean people, unified wisdom was no longer possible. Now it was necessary to teach in India as the Indian body demanded, and again differently in Persia, differently in Egypt, differently among the Greeks and Romans, and again differently among the ancient Germanic peoples. But in all true forms of religion, that from which they arose lives on. In Atlantis, enlightenment was communicated through life, not through teaching. The sign of the vortex immediately awakened feelings. Today, feelings must first be ignited by concepts. The seven petitions of the Lord's Prayer were also once communicated like a musical scale in seven tones, connected with certain seven colors and smells.
This is how the Atlantean student experienced the sevenfold nature of the human being. The greatest of the religious teachers, Christ, poured this into the Lord's Prayer. Everyone who prays the Lord's Prayer experiences its effect. It is not actually a mantra, although it can have mantric powers. It is a thought mantra. Of course, it had the greatest power in the original language. But since it is a thought mantra, it will not lose its power even if it is translated into a thousand languages. Just as one can digest food without knowing the laws of digestion, so one can reap the fruits of the Lord's Prayer even without knowledge, although those with higher knowledge reap quite different fruits from it.
Such was the path taken by religious truths. All our souls were once somnambulistic in the world soul. It was divided and drawn down into many bodies. Spiritual perception was obscured, as was the possibility of recalling the original state. Religious teachings, and especially the formulas that were brought from the spiritual world, are only an echo in concepts and words. The wisdom of the Old Testament still speaks of primordial ideas and concepts. A faint reflection of the primordial ideas lives on in the concepts. But that primordial wisdom is not lost. It still rests in our slumbering souls. And to raise this to clear consciousness is the work of spiritual science. When, after the last incarnation, man has come to know the whole outer world, he will be accepted into the original clairvoyance and bring with him new enlightenment, clear consciousness. To merge into universal consciousness is salvation, they say in the East. It will not be so. In the past, before the first incarnation, there was no ego consciousness. But it will be there after the last incarnation. Every drop of the one soul fluid is colored with a very specific color, each with a different one. In the end, everyone brings their own color with them, and the formerly clear, bright water becomes iridescent with infinitely beautiful, luminous colors, each of which is unique. Each brings its own specific color, its individual consciousness, which cannot be lost. Harmony of all consciousnesses is ultimately universal consciousness. In freedom, the many will be one, because they so desire! We must imagine this as it really is. Each individual consciousness is wholly contained in universal consciousness.
This development of humanity is not in vain. Yes, life has a meaning, and the most beautiful meaning is that man will ultimately lay down at the altar of the deity the piece of human existence that he himself has acquired. And from this is woven the garment that the earth spirit spins, as Goethe so beautifully and upliftingly says:
In the floods of life, in the storm of deeds
I surge up and down,
Weaving back and forth!
Birth and grave,
An eternal sea,
A changing weave,
A glowing life,
Thus I work at the whirring loom of time,
And weave the living garment of the deity.