Christianity as Mystical Fact
GA 8
XI. The Nature of Christianity
[ 1 ] The deepest effect must have been produced upon believers in Christianity by the fact that the Divine, the Word, the eternal Logos no longer came to them in the dim twilight of the Mysteries as spirit only, but that when they spoke of the Logos they were made to think of the historical, human personality of Jesus. Formerly the Logos had been materially seer only in different degrees of human perfection. The delicate, subtle differences in the spiritual life of personalities could be observed, and the manner and degree in which the Logos came alive within those seeking initiation. A higher degree of maturity was to be interpreted as a higher stage of evolution of spiritual life. The preparatory steps had to be sought in a spiritual life already passed through, and the present life was to be regarded as the preparatory stage for future degrees of spiritual evolution. The conservation of the spiritual force of the soul and the eternity of that force could be asserted in the words of the Jewish occult teaching in the book of Sohar: “Nothing in the world is lost, nothing falls prey to the void, not even the words and voice of man: everything has its place and purport.” Any given personality was but one metamorphosis of the soul that develops from one personality to another. The single life of a personality was only considered as a link in the chain of development stretching backwards and forwards.
This Logos, transforming itself within the many single human personalities, has through Christianity been directed away from these to the one unique personality of Jesus. What had previously been distributed throughout the world was now united in one unique personality. Jesus became the unique GodMan. In Jesus something was present once which must appear to man as the greatest of ideals, and with which, in the course of man’s repeated lives, he should unite himself more and more. Jesus took upon Himself the divinization of the whole of humanity. In Him was sought what formerly could only be sought in one’s own soul. One no longer beheld the Divine and Eternal Within the personality of a man; all that was now beheld in Jesus. It is not the eternal part of the soul that conquers death and will one day rise through its own Power, as the Divine; but it is that which was in Jesus, the one God, who will appear and raise the souls of men.
It follows from this that an entirely new meaning was given to personality. The eternal, immortal aspect had been taken from it. Only the personality, as such, was left. If immortality were not to be denied, it had to be ascribed to this personality itself. Out of the belief in the soul’s eternal metamorphosis arose the belief in personal immortality. Personality acquired infinite importance, because it was the only thing left to man Henceforth there is nothing between personality and the infinite God. A direct relation with Him must b established. Man was no longer capable of becoming divine himself, in a greater or lesser degree. He was simply man, standing in a direct but outward relation to God. This brought quite a new note into the conception of the world for those who knew the point of view held in the ancient Mysteries. There were doubtless many people in this position during the first centuries of Christianity. They knew the nature of the Mysteries. If they wished to become Christians they were obliged to come to an understanding with the old order. This must have brought about most difficult conflicts within their souls. They doubtless sought in every way to harmonize the two tendencies in the conception of the world. This conflict is reflected in the writings of early Christian times: in those of pagans attracted by the sublimity of Christianity, as well as in the writings of those Christians who found it hard to give up the ways of the Mysteries. Slowly did Christianity grow out of these Mysteries. On the one hand Christian convictions were presented in the form of the Mystery truths, and on the other, the Mystery wisdom was clothed in Christian words.
Clement of Alexandria,1Ob. 217 A. D. a Christian writer whose education had been pagan, is an instance of this. “God has not forbidden us to rest from good deeds when keeping the sabbath. He permits those who can grasp them to share in the divine Mysteries and in the sacred light. He has not revealed to the masses what is not suitable for them, but only to a few whom he judged able to grasp it and to work out in themselves the unspeakable mystery which God confided to the Logos, not to the written word. And God hath set some in the Church as apostles; and some profits; and some evangelists; and some pastors and teachers for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ.” Individual souls in those days sought by very different paths to find the way from the ancient views to the Christian ones. And the one who thought he was on the right path called others heretics. In the meanwhile, the Church grew stronger and stronger as an outward institution. The more power it gained, the more did the path recognized as the right one by the decisions of councils take the place of personal research. It was for the Church to decide who deviated too far from the divine truth which she guarded. The idea of a “heretic” took firmer and firmer shape. During the first centuries of Christianity the search for the divine path was a much more personal matter than it afterwards became. A long distance had been travelled before the conviction of Augustine became possible: “I should not believe in the truth of the Gospels unless the authority of the Catholic Church forced me to do so.” (cf. p. 116).
[ 2 ] The conflict between the method of the Mysteries and that of the Christian religion acquired a special stamp through the various Gnostic sects and writersWe may class as Gnostics all the writers of the first Christian centuries who sought for a deep, spiritual meaning in Christian teachings.2A brilliant account of the development of the Gnosis is give" in G. R. S. Mead’s book mentioned above, Fragments of a Faith Forgotten. We understand the Gnostics when we look upon them as saturated with the ancient wisdom of the Mysteries and as striving t0 understand Christianity from that point of view. For them Christ was the Logos, and as such primarily of a spiritual nature. In His primal essence He cannot reach man from without. He must be awakened in the soul But the historical Jesus must bear some relation to this spiritual Logos. This was the crucial point for the Gnostics. Some settled it in one way, some in another; but the essential point common to them all was that to arrive at a true understanding of the Christ-idea, mere historical tradition was not enough, but that it must be sought either in the wisdom of the Mysteries, or in the Neo-Platonic philosophy, derived from the same source and flourishing in the early Christian centuries. The Gnostics had confidence in human wisdom, and believed it capable of bringing forth a Christ by whom the historical Christ could be measured: in fact, through whom alone the latter could be understood and beheld in the right light.
[ 3 ] Of special interest from this point of view is the doctrine given in the books of Dionysius the Areopagite. It is true that there is no mention of these writings till the sixth century; but it matters little when and where they were written, the point being that they give an account of Christianity which is clothed in the language of the Neo-Platonic philosophy and presented in the form of a spiritual contemplation of the higher world. At all events, this is a form of delineation that belongs to the first Christian centuries. In older times the truth was handed on in the form of oral tradition; the most important things were never entrusted to writing. The Christianity described in the writings of Dionysius is set forth in the mirror of the Neo-Platonic conception of the world. Sense-perception dims man's spiritual vision. He must reach out beyond the senses. But all human concepts are primarily derived from sense-observation. What man perceives with his senses he calls existent; what he does not thus perceive he calls non-existent. If, therefore, he wishes to open up an actual view of the Divine he must rise above existence and non-existence, for these also, as he conceives them, have their origin in the sphere of the senses. In this sense God is neither existent nor non-existent; He is super-existent. Consequently He cannot be reached by means of ordinary cognition, which has to do with existing things. We must be raised above ourselves, above our sense-observation, above our reasoning logic, if we are to find the way to spiritual vision. Thence we are able to get a glimpse into the perspectives of the Divine.
But this super-existent Divinity has brought forth the Logos, the basis of the universe, filled with wisdom, and even the small powers of man can reach Him. He appears in the cosmos as the spiritual Son of God, He is the Mediator between God and man. He may be present in man in varying degrees. He may be realized in an external institution, in which those diversely imbued with His spirit are grouped into a hierarchy. A “church” of this kind is the outer reality of the Logos and the power that lives in it lived in a personal way in the Christ become flesh, in Jesus. Thus the Church is through Jesus united to God: Jesus is its culmination and its meaning.
[ 4 ] One thing was clear to all Gnosis, that it must come to an understanding about the personality of Jesus. Christ and Jesus must be brought into relationship with one another. Divinity had been taken from human personality and must, in one way or another, be recovered. It must be possible to find it again in Jesus. The mystic was concerned with a degree of .divinity within himself and with his earthly personality. The Christian was concerned with the latter and also with a perfect God, exalted above all that 1s-atta1nahie by humanity. 1f we hold firmly to this point of view, a fundamental mystic attitude of the soul is only possible when the soul’s spiritual eyes are opened; when, through finding higher spiritual possibilities within herself, the soul throws herself open to the light which issues from the Christ in Jesus. Union of the soul with her highest powers is at the same time union with the historical Christ. For mysticism is the direct consciousness and feeling of the Divine within the soul. But a God, so far transcending everything human, can never dwell in the soul in the real sense of the word. The Gnosis and all subsequent Christian mysticism represent the effort, in some way or other, nevertheless to lay hold of that God, and to apprehend Him directly in the soul.
A conflict in this case was inevitable. It was really only possible for a man to find his own divine part, but this is both human and divine—the Divine at a certain stage of development. Yet the Christian God is a definite one, perfect in Himself. It was possible for a person to find in himself the power to strive upwards to this God, but he could not characterize what he experienced in his own soul, at any stage of development, as being one with God. An abyss opened between that which it was possible to find in the soul and that which Christianity called Divine. It is the abyss between knowledge and faith, between cognition and religious feeling.
This chasm cannot exist for the mystic in the old sense of the word; for he knows that he can only comprehend the Divine by degrees, and he also knows why this is so. It is clear to him that this gradual attainment is a real attainment of divine life, and he finds it difficult to speak of a perfect, finished divine principle. A mystic of this kind does not seek a perfect God; he seeks to experience the divine life. He seeks to be made Divine himself, not to gain an external relation to the Godhead.
It lies in the nature of Christianity that its mysticism is not in this sense void of presuppositions. The Christian mystic seeks to behold divinity within himself, hut at the same time he must look up to the historical Christ just as his physical eyes look up to the sun. Just as the forces of the physical eyes behold physical objects through the power of the sun, so does the Christian mystic's intensified inner soul force behold the Divine through the light that is shed by the appearance of Christ. HE IS! This enables me to rise to the Highest in me. It is in this way that the Christian mystics of the Middle Ages differ from the mystics of the ancient Mysteries.3Cf. my book, Mystics of the Renaissance.
Vom Wesen des Christentums
[ 1 ] Die tiefste Wirkung mußte es auf die Bekenner des Christentums ausüben, daß ihnen das Göttliche, das Wort, der ewige Logos nicht mehr in dem geheimnisvollen Dunkel des Mysteriums, als Geist allein, entgegentrat; sondern das sie, wenn sie von diesem Logos sprachen, immer auf die geschichtliche, menschliche Persönlichkeit Jesu gewiesen wurden. Vorher hatte man ja innerhalb der Wirklichkeit diesen Logos nur auf verschiedenen Stufen menschlicher Vollkommenheiten gesehen. Man konnte die feinen, intimen Unterschiede im Geistesdasein der Persönlichkeit beobachten und konnte sehen, in welchen Arten und Graden in den einzelnen Persönlichkeiten, welche die Einweihung suchten, der Logos lebendig wurde, Einen höheren Reifegrad mußte man als eine höhere Entwicklungsstufe des geistigen Daseins deuten. Man mußte die Vorstufen dazu in einem abgelebten Geistesleben suchen. Und das gegenwärtige Leben konnte man als Vorstufe von künftigen geistigen Entwicklungsstufen ansehen. Die Erhaltung der geistigen Kraft der Seele, die Ewigkeit dieser Kraft durfte man behaupten im Sinne der jüdischen Geheimlehre (Buch Sohar): «Nichts geht in der Welt verloren, nichts fällt der Leere anheim, nicht einmal die Worte und die Stimme des Menschen; alles hat seine Stelle und seine Bestimmung.» Die Eine Persönlichkeit war nur eine Metamorphose der Seele, die sich von Persönlichkeit zu Persönlichkeit wandelt. Das einzelne Leben der Persönlichkeit kam nur als ein Entwicklungsglied einer nach vorwärts und rückwärts weisenden Kette in Betracht. — Dieser sich wandelnde Logos ist durch das Christentum von der einzelnen Persönlichkeit hingeleitet worden auf die einzige Persönlichkeit Jesu. Was früher auf die ganze Welt verteilt war: das wurde nunmehr auf eine einzige Persönlichkeit vereinigt. Jesus ist der einzige Gottmensch geworden. In Jesus ist damit etwas einmal gegenwärtig gewesen, das dem Menschen als das größte Ideal erscheinen muß, mit dem er sich durch seine wiederholten Leben in der Zukunft immer mehr vereinigen soll. Jesus hat die Vergottung der ganzen Menschheit auf sich genommen. In ihm wurde gesucht, was vorher nur in der eigenen Seele gesucht werden konnte. Man hatte der Persönlichkeit des Menschen das entrissen, was in ihr selbst immer als Göttliches, als Ewiges gefunden worden war. Und man konnte alles dieses Ewige in Jesus schauen. Nicht das Ewige in der Seele überwindet den Tod und wird durch seine Kraft dereinst als Göttliches auferweckt, sondern was in Jesus war, der einige Gott, wird erscheinen und die Seelen auferwecken. Es war damit gegeben, daß die Persönlichkeit eine ganz neue Bedeutung erhielt. Man hatte ihr das Ewige, das Unsterbliche genommen. Sie war als solche, für sich, übrig geblieben. Man mußte, wollte man nicht die Ewigkeit leugnen, dieser Persönlichkeit selbst die Unsterblichkeit zuschreiben. Aus dem Glauben an die ewige Wandelung der Seele wurde der persönliche Unsterblichkeitsglaube. Eine unendliche Wichtigkeit erhielt ja diese Persönlichkeit, weil sie das einzige war, was man am Menschen festhielt. — Es gibt fortan nichts mehr zwischen der Persönlichkeit und dem unendlichen Gott. Man muß sich zu ihm in ein unmittelbares Verhältnis setzen. Man war nicht mehr in höherem oder niederem Grade selbst derVergöttlichung fähig; man war einfach Mensch und stand zu Gott in einem unmittelbaren, aber äußeren Verhältnisse. Wer die alte Mysterienanschauung kannte, mußte das als einen ganz neuen Ton in der Weltanschauung empfinden. In diesem Falle waren wohl zahlreiche Persönlichkeiten der ersten christlichen Jahrhunderte. Sie wußten von der Art der Mysterien; wollten sie Christen werden, so mußten sie sich mit dieser alten Art auseinandersetzen. Das mag sie In die schwierigsten Seelenkämpfe gebracht haben. In der mannigfaltigsten Art mögen sie einen Ausgleich gesucht haben zwischen beiden Richtungen der Weltanschauung. Die Schriften der ersten christlichen Jahrhunderte spiegeln diesen Kampf; sowohl die der Heiden, die von der Hoheit des Christentums angezogen werden, wie auch diejenigen der Christen, denen es schwer wird, die Mysterienweise zu verlassen. Langsam wächst das Christentum aus dem Mysterienwesen heraus. Christliche Überzeugungen werden in der Form der Mysterienwahrheiten vorgetragen; Mysterienweisheit wird in die Worte des Christentums gekleidet. Klemens von Alexandrien, der heidnisch gebildete christliche Schriftsteller (gestorben 217 n. Chr.) gibt davon ein Beispiel: «Gott hat uns nicht versagt, vom Guten auszuruhen in der Feier des Sabbats; denen, die es fassen können, hat er verliehen, an den göttlichen Geheimnissen und an dem heiligen Lichte teilzunehmen; er hat nicht der Menge geoffenbart, was sich für sie nicht schickt, sondern nur wenigen, für die er es geziemend erachtete, die es fassen können und sich darnach bilden, wie Gott das Unaussprechliche dem Logos vertraut, nicht der Schrift. — Gott hat der Kirche einige als Apostel gegeben, andre als Propheten, andre als Evangelisten, andre als Hirten und Lehrer zur Vollendung der Heiligen, zum Werke des Dienstes, zur Erbauung des Leibes Christi.» Auf die mannigfaltigste Art suchen die Persönlichkeiten den Weg von den antiken Anschauungen zu den christlichen zu finden. Und wer auf dem rechten Wege zu sein glaubt, bezeichnet andere als Irrlehrer. Daneben befestigt sich immer mehr die Kirche als äußere Institution. Je mehr sie an Macht gewann, desto mehr trat der Weg, den sie durch die Konzil-Beschlüsse, durch äußere Festsetzung als den richtigen anerkannte, an die Stelle des persönlichen Forschens. Sie entschied, wer zu weit abwich von der von ihr bewahrten göttlichen Wahrheit. Der Begriff des «Irrlehrers» bekam eine immer festere Gestalt. In den ersten Jahrhunderten des Christentums war das Suchen des göttlichen Weges viel mehr persönliche Angelegenheit als in den späteren. Es war erst ein langer Weg zurückzulegen, bis die Überzeugung des Augustinus möglich war: «Ich würde an die Wahrheit der Evangelien nicht glauben, wenn mich nicht die Autorität der katholischen Kirche dazu zwänge» (vergleiche Seite 108).
[ 2 ] Der Kampf zwischen der Mysterienart und der christlichen bekam eine besondere Prägung durch die verschiedenen «gnostischen» Sekten und Schriftsteller. Als Gnostiker kann man alle Schriftsteller der ersten christlichen Jahrhunderte auffassen, die nach einem tieferen, geistigen Sinn der christlichen Lehren suchten. (Eine glänzende Darstellung der Entwicklung der Gnosis bietet das obengenannte Buch von Mead «Fragmente eines verschollenen Glaubens».) Man versteht diese Gnostiker, wenn man sie ansieht als durchtränkt mit alter Mysterienweisheit und bestrebt, das Christentum von dem Gesichtspunkt der Mysterien aus zu begreifen. Christus ist ihnen der Logos. Er ist zunächst als solcher geistiger Art. Er kann in seiner Urwesenheit nicht von außen an den Menschen herankommen. Er muß in der Seele erweckt werden. Aber der geschichtliche Jesus muß ein Verhältnis haben zu diesem geistigen Logos. Das war die gnostische Grundfrage. Mochte sie der eine so, der andere so lösen. Die Hauptsache bleibt, daß nicht die bloße historische Überlieferung, sondern die Mysterienweisheit, oder die aus derselben Quelle schöpfende neuplatonische Philosophie, die in den ersten christlichen Jahrhunderten blühte, zu einem wirklichen Verständnisse des Christus-Gedankens führen sollte. Man hatte Vertrauen zur Menschenweisheit und glaubte, daß sie einen Christus gebären könne, an dem der geschichtliche gemessen werden kann. Ja, durch den dieser erst verstanden und im rechten Lichte geschaut werden könne.
[ 3 ] Von besonderem Interesse, von diesem Gesichtspunkte aus, ist die Lehre, die in den Büchern des Areopagiten Dionysius auftritt. Allerdings wird dieser Schriften erst im sechsten Jahrhundert Erwähnung getan. Es kommt aber bei ihnen nicht darauf an, wann und wo sie geschrieben sind, sondern darauf, daß sie eine Darstellung des Christentums, ganz eingekleidet in die Vorstellungsart der neuplatonischen Philosophie und in ein geistiges Anschauen der höheren Welt, enthalten. Es ist dies unter allen Umständen eine Darstellungsform, die den ersten christlichen Jahrhunderten angehört. In alten Zeiten hat sich diese Darstellungsform als mündliche Tradition fortgepflanzt; man vertraute eben in den älteren Zeiten das Wichtigste gerade nicht der Schrift an. Man könnte das Christentum, das sie darstellen, ein solches nennen, das aus dem Spiegel der neuplatonischen Weltanschauung gezeigt werden sollte. Die sinnliche Wahrnehmung trübt dem Menschen das Anschauen des Geistes. Er muß über das Sinnliche hinausgehen. Nun sind aber alle menschlichen Begriffe zunächst aus der sinnlichen Beobachtung geschöpft. Was der sinnliche Mensch beobachtet, das nennt er seiend; was er nicht beobachtet, das bezeichnet er als nicht-seiend. Will der Mensch sich daher eine wirkliche Perspektive zu dem Göttlichen eröffnen, so muß er auch über das Seiende und Nicht-Seiende hinausgehen, denn auch dieses entstammt in seiner Auffassung der Sinnensphäre. Gott ist in diesem Sinne weder seiend, noch nicht-seiend. Er ist überseiend. Man kann ihn daher nicht erreichen mit den Mitteln des gewöhnlichen Erkennens, das es mit dem Seienden zu tun hat. Man muß über sich, über seine Sinnenbeobachtung, über seine verständige Logik hinausgehoben werden und den Übergang finden zu geistiger Anschauung; dann kann man ahnend in die Perspektive des Göttlichen blicken. — Aber diese überseiende Gottheit hat die weisheitsvolle Grundlage der Welt, den Logos hervorgebracht. Ihn kann auch die niedere Kraft des Menschen erreichen. Er wird als geistiger Sohn Gottes im Weltgebäude gegenwärtig; er ist der Mittler zwischen Gott und dem Menschen. Er kann in verschiedenen Stufen im Menschen gegenwärtig sein. Ihn kann eine weltliche Institution verwirklichen, indem sie die in verschiedener Art von ihm erfüllten Menschen unter einer Hierarchie vereinigt. Eine solche «Kirche» ist der sinnlich-wirklicheLogos; und die Kraft, die in ihr lebt, lebte persönlich in dem fleischgewordenen Christus, in Jesus. Durch Jesus ist also die Kirche mit Gott vereinigt, in ihm hat sie ihre Spitze und ihren Sinn.
[ 4 ] Es war für alle Gnosis klar: mit der Idee von Jesu Persönlichkeit mußte sie sich verständigen. Christus und Jesus mußten in ein Verhältnis gebracht werden. Die Göttlichkeit war der menschlichen Persönlichkeit genommen; sie mußte auf irgend eine Art wieder gefunden werden. Es mußte möglich sein, sie in Jesus wieder zu finden. Der Myste hatte mit einem Grade der Göttlichkeit in sich und mit seiner irdisch-sinnlichen Persönlichkeit zu tun. Der Christ hatte mit dieser und mit einem vollendeten, über alles menschlich Erreichbare erhabenen Gott zu tun. Wird diese Anschauung streng festgehalten, so ist eine mystische Grundstimmung der Seele nur möglich, wenn dieser Seele, indem sie das höhere Geistige in sich findet, das geistige Auge so geöffnet wird, daß in dieses das Licht fällt, welches von dem Christus in dem Jesus ausgeht. Vereinigung der Seele mit ihren höchsten Kräften ist zugleich Vereinigung mit dem geschichtlichen Christus. Denn Mystik ist unmittelbares Fühlen und Empfinden des Göttlichen in der eigenen Seele. Ein über alles Menschliche hinausragender Gott kann aber im wahren Sinne des Wortes nie in der Seele wohnen. Die Gnosis und auch alle spätere christliche Mystik stellen das Bestreben dar, dieses Gottes doch auf irgend eine Art in der Seele unmittelbar teilhaftig zu werden. Ein Kampf mußte da immer entstehen. Man konnte in Wirklichkeit nur sein Göttliches finden, das ist aber ein Menschlich-Göttliches, ein Göttliches auf einer bestimmten Entwicklungsstufe. Aber der christliche Gott ist doch ein bestimmter, in sich vollendeter. Man konnte in sich finden die Kraft, zu ihm emporzustreben; aber man konnte nicht etwas, was man in der Seele auf irgend einer Stufe erlebte, als eins mit ihm bezeichnen. Zwischen dem, was man in der Seele erkennen konnte, und dem, was das Christentum als göttlich bezeichnete, entstand eine Kluft. Es ist die Kluft zwischen Wissen und Glauben, zwischen Erkennen und religiösem Empfinden. Für den Mysten im alten Sinne kann es diese Kluft nicht geben. Denn er weiß zwar, daß er das Göttliche nur gradweise erfassen kann; aber er weiß auch, warum er nur dies kann. Er ist sich klar, daß er in dem gradweisen Göttlichen doch das wahre, lebendige Göttliche hat; und es wird ihm schwer, von einem vollendeten, abgeschlossenen Göttlichen zu sprechen. Ein solcher Myste will gar nicht den vollendeten Gott erkennen, sondern er will das göttliche Leben erfahren. Er will selbst vergottet-sein; er will nicht ein äußerliches Verhältnis zur Gottheit gewinnen. Es ist in dem Wesen des Christentums gelegen, daß seine Mystik nicht in diesem Sinne voraussetzungslos ist. Der christliche Mystiker will in sich selbst die Gottheit schauen, aber er muß zu dem geschichtlichen Christus hinblicken wie das physische Auge zur Sonne; wie dieses sich sagt: durch diese Sonne werde ich erblicken, was ich durch meine Kräfte sehen kann, so sagt der christliche Myste: ich steigere mein Inneres zu göttlichem Schauen; das Licht, das mir solches Schauen ermöglicht, ist in dem erschienenen Christus gegeben. Er ist, wodurch ich in mir zum Höchsten steigen kann. Die christlichen Mystiker des Mittelalters zeigen gerade darin ihren Unterschied von den Mysten der alten Mysterien. (Vergleiche mein Buch: Die Mystik im Aufgange des neuzeitlichen Geisteslebens. Berlin 1901.)
The essence of Christianity
[ 1 ] The fact that the divine, the Word, the eternal Logos no longer confronted them in the mysterious darkness of the Mystery, as Spirit alone, must have had the most profound effect on the confessors of Christianity; but that, when they spoke of this Logos, they were always pointed to the historical, human personality of Jesus. Previously, this Logos had only been seen within reality on various levels of human perfection. One could observe the subtle, intimate differences in the spiritual existence of the personality and could see in what ways and degrees the Logos came to life in the individual personalities who sought initiation, A higher degree of maturity had to be interpreted as a higher stage of development of spiritual existence. One had to look for the preliminary stages in a past spiritual life. And the present life could be seen as a preliminary stage of future spiritual stages of development. The preservation of the spiritual power of the soul, the eternity of this power could be asserted in the sense of the Jewish secret teachings (Book of Sohar): "Nothing is lost in the world, nothing falls to emptiness, not even the words and the voice of man; everything has its place and its destiny." The One Personality was only a metamorphosis of the soul, which changes from personality to personality. The individual life of the personality could only be considered as a developmental link in a chain pointing forwards and backwards. - Through Christianity, this changing Logos has been led from the individual personality to the only personality of Jesus. What used to be distributed throughout the whole world has now been united in a single personality. Jesus has become the only God-man. In Jesus something has thus once been present that must appear to man as the greatest ideal, with which he is to unite himself more and more through his repeated lives in the future. Jesus took upon himself the idolization of all mankind. In him was sought what previously could only be sought in one's own soul. That which had always been found in man's personality as divine, as eternal, had been snatched from him. And one could see all this eternity in Jesus. It is not the eternal in the soul that overcomes death and will one day be resurrected as divine through its power, but what was in Jesus, the one God, will appear and resurrect souls. This gave personality a completely new meaning. The eternal, the immortal had been taken from it. It had remained as such, for itself. If one did not want to deny eternity, one had to ascribe immortality to this personality itself. The belief in the eternal change of the soul became the personal belief in immortality. After all, this personality was given infinite importance because it was the only thing that people held on to. - From then on there is nothing between the personality and the infinite God. One must place oneself in a direct relationship to him. One was no longer capable of deification to a higher or lower degree; one was simply human and stood in a direct but external relationship to God. Those who knew the old Mystery view must have perceived this as a completely new tone in the world view. Numerous personalities of the first Christian centuries were probably in this case. They knew about the nature of the Mysteries; if they wanted to become Christians, they had to come to terms with this old way. This may have brought them into the most difficult struggles of the soul. They may have sought a balance between the two world views in the most diverse ways. The writings of the first Christian centuries reflect this struggle; both those of the pagans who are attracted by the majesty of Christianity and those of the Christians who find it difficult to leave the Mystery Way. Christianity is slowly growing out of the mystery world. Christian beliefs are presented in the form of mystery truths; mystery wisdom is clothed in the words of Christianity. Clement of Alexandria, the pagan-educated Christian writer (died 217 AD) gives an example of this. ) gives an example of this: "God has not denied us to rest from good in the celebration of the Sabbath; to those who can grasp it, he has granted to participate in the divine mysteries and in the holy light; he has not revealed to the multitude what is not suitable for them, but only to a few for whom he deemed it fitting, who can grasp it and form themselves according to it, just as God entrusts the inexpressible to the Logos, not to Scripture. - God has given some to the church as apostles, others as prophets, others as evangelists, others as shepherds and teachers for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ." In the most varied ways, personalities seek to find their way from ancient views to Christian ones. And those who believe they are on the right path label others as false teachers. At the same time, the church as an external institution became more and more entrenched. The more power it gained, the more the path that it recognized as the right one through council resolutions and external determination took the place of personal research. It decided who deviated too far from the divine truth it had preserved. The term "false teacher" became more and more firmly established. In the first centuries of Christianity, the search for the divine path was much more of a personal matter than in the later centuries. There was a long way to go before Augustine's conviction was possible: "I would not believe in the truth of the Gospels if the authority of the Catholic Church did not compel me to do so" (see page 108).
[ 2 ] The struggle between the Mystery Way and the Christian Way was given a special character by the various "Gnostic" sects and writers. All writers of the first Christian centuries who searched for a deeper, spiritual meaning to the Christian teachings can be understood as Gnostics. (The above-mentioned book by Mead, "Fragments of a Lost Faith", offers a brilliant account of the development of Gnosticism). One understands these Gnostics if one sees them as imbued with ancient mystery wisdom and endeavoring to understand Christianity from the point of view of the mysteries. To them, Christ is the Logos. As such, he is initially of a spiritual nature. He cannot approach man in his primordial being from outside. He must be awakened in the soul. But the historical Jesus must have a relationship to this spiritual Logos. That was the basic Gnostic question. One may solve it this way, the other that way. The main thing remains that it was not mere historical tradition, but the wisdom of the Mysteries, or the Neoplatonic philosophy, which drew from the same source and flourished in the first Christian centuries, that was to lead to a real understanding of the idea of Christ. People had confidence in human wisdom and believed that it could give birth to a Christ against whom the historical Christ could be measured. Indeed, through which it could only be understood and seen in the right light.
[ 3 ] Of particular interest, from this point of view, is the teaching that appears in the books of the Areopagite Dionysius. However, these writings are not mentioned until the sixth century. But what matters is not when and where they were written, but the fact that they contain a presentation of Christianity, completely clothed in the conceptual style of Neoplatonic philosophy and in a spiritual view of the higher world. Under all circumstances, this is a form of representation that belongs to the first Christian centuries. In ancient times, this form of presentation was propagated as an oral tradition; in older times, the most important things were not entrusted to the Scriptures. One could call the Christianity they represent one that should be shown from the mirror of the Neoplatonic world view. Sensual perception clouds man's vision of the spirit. He must go beyond the sensual. But all human concepts are initially drawn from sensory observation. What the sensual man observes, he calls being; what he does not observe, he calls non-being. Therefore, if man wants to open up a real perspective on the divine, he must also go beyond the existing and non-existing, because in his view this also originates from the sensory sphere. In this sense, God is neither existent nor non-existent. He is supersubstantial. He can therefore not be reached by the means of ordinary cognition, which has to do with the existing. One must be lifted above oneself, above one's sensory observation, above one's sensible logic, and find the transition to spiritual contemplation; then one can look forebodingly into the perspective of the divine. - But this supersensible deity has produced the wisdom-filled foundation of the world, the Logos. The lower power of man can also reach him. He is present as the spiritual Son of God in the world structure; he is the mediator between God and man. He can be present in man in various stages. A worldly institution can realize him by uniting people who are filled with him in various ways under a hierarchy. Such a "church" is the sensual-real logos; and the power that lives in it lived personally in the incarnate Christ, in Jesus. Through Jesus, therefore, the church is united with God; in him it has its head and its meaning.
[ 4 ] It was clear to all gnosis: it had to come to an understanding with the idea of Jesus' personality. Christ and Jesus had to be brought into a relationship. Divinity had been taken from the human personality; it had to be found again in some way. It had to be possible to find it again in Jesus. The Myste had to deal with a degree of divinity in himself and with his earthly-sensual personality. The Christian had to do with this and with a perfected God, exalted above everything humanly attainable. If this view is strictly adhered to, then a mystical basic mood of the soul is only possible if this soul, by finding the higher spiritual within itself, has its spiritual eye opened in such a way that the light which emanates from the Christ in Jesus falls into it. Union of the soul with its highest powers is at the same time union with the historical Christ. For mysticism is the direct feeling and sensing of the divine in one's own soul. However, a God who transcends all humanity can never dwell in the soul in the true sense of the word. Gnosticism and all later Christian mysticism represent the endeavor to become a direct partaker of this God in some way in the soul. A struggle always had to arise. In reality one could only find one's divine, but that is a human-divine, a divine at a certain stage of development. But the Christian God is a definite God who is complete in himself. One could find in oneself the power to strive upwards to him; but one could not describe something that one experienced in the soul at any level as one with him. There was a gulf between what one could recognize in the soul and what Christianity called divine. It is the gap between knowledge and faith, between cognition and religious feeling. For the mystic in the old sense, this gulf cannot exist. For he knows that he can only grasp the divine in degrees; but he also knows why he can only do this. He is aware that he has the true, living divine in the gradual divine; and it is difficult for him to speak of a complete, self-contained divine. Such a man does not want to recognize the perfect God, but he wants to experience the divine life. He wants to be divine himself; he does not want to gain an external relationship with the divinity. It is in the nature of Christianity that its mysticism is not unconditional in this sense. The Christian mystic wants to see the Godhead in himself, but he must look to the historical Christ as the physical eye looks to the sun; just as the physical eye says to itself: through this sun I will see what I can see through my powers, so the Christian mystic says: I raise my inner being to divine vision; the light that makes such vision possible for me is given in the Christ who has appeared. He is through whom I can rise to the highest within myself. The Christian mystics of the Middle Ages show their difference from the mystics of the ancient mysteries precisely in this. (Compare my book: Die Mystik im Aufgange des neuzeitlichen Geisteslebens. Berlin 1901.)