Knowledge of Higher Worlds and its Attainment
GA 10
Appendix
[ 1 ] The path to supersensible knowledge, as described in this book, leads the soul through experiences concerning the nature of which it is especially important to avoid all illusions and misconceptions. Yet it is but natural that the latter should arise in such questions as are here considered. In this connection one of the most serious mistakes occurs when the whole range of inner experience dealt with in true spiritual science is distorted into appearing in the same category as superstition, visionary dreaming, mediumship (spiritism), and other degenerate practices. This distortion is often due to the fact that persons desirous of following the path described in this book are confused with others who in their search for supersensible reality, and as a result of methods foreign to genuine striving for knowledge, wander into undesirable paths. The experiences through which the human soul lives on the path here described are wholly confined to the realm of psycho-spiritual experience. They are only possible if equal freedom and independence from the bodily life are attained for certain other inner experiences, as is the case during ordinary consciousness, when thoughts are made concerning things outwardly perceived or inwardly felt and willed, thoughts which do not themselves originate in what is perceived, felt, and willed. There are people who deny the existence of such thoughts. They believe that no thought is possible that is not extracted from perceptions or from the inner life dependent on the body. For them, all thoughts are to a certain extent mere reflections of perceptions and of inner experiences. This view, however, can be expressed only by those who have never raised themselves to the faculty of experiencing with their souls a self-sustaining life in pure thought. For others, who have lived through this experience, it is a matter of knowledge that wherever thought dominates the life of the soul to the degree that this thought permeates other soul functions, the human being is involved in an activity in whose origin his body has no share. In the ordinary life of the soul, thought is almost always mixed with other functions: perception, feeling, willing and so forth. These other functions are effectuated by the body; yet thought plays into them, and to the degree that it does this a process takes place, in and through the human being, in which his body has no share. This can only be denied so long as the illusion is not discarded which arises from observing thought only when the latter is united with other functions. Yet an inner exertion is possible which will enable the thinking part of inner life to be experienced as distinct from everything else. Something consisting in pure thought alone can be detached from the encompassing soul-life, that is, thoughts that are self-sustaining and from which everything provided by perception or bodily conditioned inner life is excluded. Such thoughts reveal themselves through themselves, through what they are, as spiritual supersensible substance. Anyone uniting himself with them, while excluding all perception, all memory, and every other token of inner life, knows himself to be in a supersensible region and experiences himself outside the physical body. For anyone familiar with this whole process, the question can no longer arise: Can the soul live through experiences outside the body in a supersensible world? For it would mean denying what he knows from experience. The only question for him is: What prevents such a positive fact from being recognized? And the answer he finds to this question is that the fact does not reveal itself unless the student first cultivates a condition of soul which allows him to become the recipient of this revelation.
Now, people become at once suspicious when an activity confined entirely to the soul is expected of them, in order that something independent of themselves should reveal itself. They believe that they themselves give the revelation its content because they prepare themselves to receive it. They expect experiences to which they contribute nothing and which allow them to remain quite passive. Should such people, in addition, be ignorant of the simplest scientific requirements for the comprehension of a given fact, they will take for an objective revelation of non-sensible substances contents and productions of the soul in which the soul's conscious participation is reduced below the level maintained in sense-perception and will-impelled action. Such are the soul-contents provided by the experiences and revelations of the visionary and the medium. But what comes to the fore through such revelations is not a supersensible but a sub-sensible world. Human waking life does not run its course completely within the body; the most conscious part of it runs its course on the boundary between the body and the physical outer world; thus the process of perception with the organs of sense is as much an extra-physical process penetrating into the body as a permeation of this process from out [of] the body; so too, is the life of will, which rests upon the insertion of the human being into the cosmic being, so that what occurs in the human being through his will is simultaneously a link in the chain of cosmic occurrence. In this life of the soul running on the boundary of the physical body, the human being is to a high degree dependent on his physical organization; but the function of thought plays into this activity, and in as much as this is the case, the human being makes himself independent of his bodily organization in the functions of sense perception and willing. In the experiences of the visionary and in mediumistic phenomena the human being becomes completely dependent on his body. He excludes from the life of his soul that function which, in perception and willing, makes him independent of his body. Thus the content and productions of his soul are merely revelations of his bodily life. The experiences of the visionary and the phenomena produced by the medium owe their existence to the fact that a person while thus experiencing and producing is, with his soul, less independent of his body than in ordinary perception and willing. In the experience of the supersensible as indicated in this book, the development of soul-life proceeds in just the opposite direction from that taken by the visionary and the medium. The soul acquires a progressively greater independence of the body than is the case in perceiving and willing. The same independence realized in the experience of pure thought is attained by the soul for a far wider range of activity.
[ 2 ] For the supersensible activity of the soul here meant, it is especially important to grasp and realize in the clearest possible way this experience of life in pure thought. For in the main, this experience is already a supersensible activity of the soul, but one in which nothing supersensible is as yet perceived. With pure thought we live in the supersensible; but we experience only this in supersensible fashion; we do not yet experience anything else supersensibly. And supersensible experience must be a continuation of that life already attained by the soul when united with pure thought. For this reason it is so important to gain knowledge of this union in the right way, for it is from its comprehension that light shines forth to bring correct insight into the nature of supersensible knowledge. The moment the life of the soul links below the level of clear consciousness existing in thought, the soul is on the wrong path as far as true knowledge of the supersensible world is concerned: for the soul is seized by the bodily functions, and what is then experienced is not the revelation of a supersensible world, but bodily revelations confined to the supersensible world.
[ 3 ] (2) Having penetrated to the sphere of the supersensible, the soul's experiences are of such a nature that descriptive expressions cannot so easily be found for them as for experiences confined to the world of the senses. Care must often be taken not to overlook the fact that to a certain extent, in descriptions of supersensible experience, the distance separating the actual fact from the language used to describe it is greater than in descriptions of physical experience. The reader must be at pains to realize that many an expression is intended as an illustration, merely indicating in a delicate way the reality to which it refers. Thus it is said on page 19 of this book: “Originally all rules and teachings of spiritual science were expressed in a symbolical sign-language.” And on page 82, a “certain writing system” was mentioned. Now, anyone may easily be led to suppose that such a writing system can be learned in the same way we learn the letters of an ordinary physical language, and their combinations. In this connection it must be pointed out that there have been and there still are spiritual scientific signs by means of which supersensible facts are expressed. And anyone initiated into the meaning of these symbols attains thereby the means of directing his inner life toward the supersensible realities in question. But what is of far greater importance for supersensible experiences is that, in the course of that supersensible experience to which the realization of the contents of this book leads, the soul should, in the contemplation of the supersensible, gain the revelation of such a writing through personal experience. The supersensible says something to the soul which the soul must translate into these illustrative signs, so that it can be surveyed with full consciousness. The statement can be made that what is imparted in this book can be realized by every soul. And in the course of this realization, which the soul can personally determine according to the indications given, the resulting events occur as described. Let the reader take this book as a conversation between the author and himself. The statement that the student needs personal instruction should be understood in the sense that this book itself is personal instruction. In earlier times there were reasons for reserving such personal instruction for oral teaching; today we have reached a stage in the evolution of humanity in which spiritual scientific knowledge must become far more widely disseminated than formerly. It must be placed within the reach of everyone to a quite different extend from what was the case in older times. Hence the book replaces the former oral instruction. It is only to a limited extent correct to say that further personal instruction is necessary beyond that contained in this book. No doubt someone may need assistance, and it may be of importance for him or her; but it would be false to believe that there are any cardinal points not mentioned in this book. These can be found by anyone who reads correctly, and, above all, completely.
[ 4 ] (3) The descriptive instructions given in this book appear at first sight to require the complete alteration of the whole human being. Yet when correctly read it will be found that nothing more is intended than a description of the inner soul state required of anyone in those moments of life at which he confronts the supersensible world. He develops this state of soul as a second being within himself; and the healthy other being pursues its course in the old way. The unfolding trainee knows how to hold the two beings apart in full consciousness and how to make them act and react on each other in the right way. This does not make him useless and incompetent for life, nor does he lose his interest and skill in it and become a spiritual researcher the whole day long. It is of course true that the student's manner of experience in the supersensible world will shed its light over his whole being; but far from distracting him from life, it makes him more capable and his life more productive. The necessity of adopting the existing method of description is due to the fact that every cognitive process directed toward the supersensible calls the whole human being into action; so that in the moment of such cognition the whole human being is engaged, while the supersensible cognitive process engages the whole human being. The whole human being becomes an eye or an ear. For this reason, when information is given concerning the construction of supersensible cognitive processes, it appears as though a transformation of the human being were meant, as if nothing were right in the ordinary human being, and he should become quite different.
[ 5 ] (4) I should like to add to what was said on pp. 131 et seq. concerning “some results of initiation,” something which, with a slight alteration, can apply to other parts of the book. It may occur to someone to ask whether such figurative descriptions are necessary, and whether it would not be possible to describe these supersensible experiences in ideas, without such illustrations. In reply it must be pointed out that for the experience of supersensible reality it is essential that the human being knew himself as a supersensible being in a supersensible world. Without this vision of his own supersensible nature, whose reality is fully manifest in the descriptions here given of the lotus flowers and the etheric body, the human being's experience of himself in the supersensible world would be like placing him in the sensible world in such a way that the things and processes around him manifested themselves, while he himself had no knowledge of his own body. His perception of his own supersensible form in soul-body and etheric body enables him to stand, conscious of himself, in the supersensible world, just as he is conscious of himself in the physical world through the perception of his physical body.
Nachwort zum achten bis elften Tausend
[ 1 ] Der Weg zu übersinnlicher Erkenntnis, der in dieser Schrift gekennzeichnet wird, führt zu einem seelischen Erleben, demgegenüber es von ganz besonderer Wichtigkeit ist, daß, wer es anstrebt, sich keinen Täuschungen und Mißverständnissen über dasselbe hingibt. Und es liegt dem Menschen nahe, sich über dasjenige zu täuschen, was hier in Betracht kommt. Eine der Täuschungen, die besonders schwerwiegende, entsteht, wenn man das ganze Gebiet des Seelenerlebens, von dem in wahrer Geisteswissenschaft die Rede ist, so verschiebt, daß es in der Umgebung des Aberglaubens, des visionären Träumens, des Mediumismus und mancher anderer Entartungen des Menschenstrebens eingereiht erscheint. Diese Verschiebung rührt oft davon her, daß Menschen, welche in ihrer von echtem Erkenntnisstreben abliegenden Art sich einen Weg in die übersinnliche Wirklichkeit suchen möchten und die dabei auf die genannten Entartungen verfallen, mit solchen verwechselt werden, die den in dieser Schrift gezeichneten Weg gehen wollen. Was auf dem hier gemeinten Wege von der Menschenseele durchlebt wird, das verläuft durchaus im Felde rein geistig-seelischen Erfahrens. Es ist nur dadurch möglich, solches zu durchleben, daß sich der Mensch auch noch für andere innere Erfahrungen so frei und unabhängig von dem Leibesleben machen kann, wie er im Erleben des gewöhnlichen Bewußtseins nur ist, wenn er sich über das von außen Wahrgenommene oder das im Innern Gewünschte, Gefühlte, Gewollte Gedanken macht, die nicht aus dem Wahrgenommenen, Gefühlten, Gewollten selbst herrühren. Es gibt Menschen, die an das Vorhandensein solcher Gedanken überhaupt nicht glauben. Diese meinen: der Mensch könne nichts denken, was er nicht aus der Wahrnehmung oder dem leiblich bedingten Innenleben herauszieht. Und alle Gedanken seien nur gewissermaßen Schattenbilder von Wahrnehmungen oder von inneren Erlebnissen. Wer dieses behauptet, der tut es nur, weil er sich niemals zu der Fähigkeit gebracht hat, mit seiner Seele das reine, in sich beruhende Gedankenleben zu erleben. Wer aber solches erlebt hat, für den ist es Erfahrung geworden, daß überall, wo im Seelenleben Denken waltet, in dem Maße, als dieses Denken andere Seelenverrichtungen durchdringt, der Mensch in einer Tätigkeit begriffen ist, an deren Zustandekommen sein Leib unbeteiligt ist. im gewöhnlichen Seelenleben ist ja fast immer das Denken mit anderen Seelenverrichtungen: Wahrnehmen, Fühlen, Wollen und so weiter vermischt. Diese anderen Verrichtungen kommen durch den Leib zustande. Aber in sie spielt das Denken hinein. Und in dem Maße, in dem es hineinspielt, geht in dem Menschen und durch den Menschen etwas vor sich, an dem der Leib nicht mitbeteiligt ist. Die Menschen, welche dieses in Abrede stellen, können nicht über die Täuschung hinauskommen, welche dadurch entsteht, daß sie die denkerische Betätigung immer mit anderen Verrichtungen vereinigt beobachten. Aber man kann im inneren Erleben sich seelisch dazu aufraffen, den denkerischen Teil des Innenlebens auch abgesondert von allem andern für sich zu erfahren. Man kann aus dem Umfange des Seelenlebens etwas herauslösen, das nur in reinen Gedanken besteht. In Gedanken, die in sich bestehen, aus denen alles ausgeschaltet ist, was Wahrnehmung oder leiblich bedingtes Innenleben geben. Solche Gedanken offenbaren sich durch sich selbst, durch das, was sie sind, als ein geistig, ein übersinnlich Wesenhaftes. Und die Seele, die mit solchen Gedanken sich vereinigt, indem sie während dieser Vereinigung alles Wahrnehmen, alles Erinnern, alles sonstige Innenleben ausschließt, weiß sich mit dem Denken selbst in einem übersinnlichen Gebiet und erlebt sich außerhalb des Leibes. Für denjenigen, welcher diesen ganzen Sachverhalt durchschaut, kann die Frage gar nicht mehr in Betracht kommen: gibt es ein Erleben der Seele in einem übersinnlichen Element außerhalb des Leibes? Denn für ihn hieße es in Abrede stellen, was er aus der Erfahrung weiß. Für ihn gibt es nur die Frage: was verhindert die Menschen, eine solche sichere Tatsache anzuerkennen? Und zu dieser Frage findet er die Antwort, daß die in Frage kommende Tatsache eine solche ist, die sich nicht offenbart, wenn der Mensch sich nicht vorher in eine solche Seelenverfassung versetzt, daß er die Offenbarung empfangen kann. Nun werden zunächst die Menschen mißtrauisch, wenn sie selbst etwas erst rein seelisch tun sollen, damit sich ihnen ein an sich von ihnen Unabhängiges offenbare. Sie glauben da, weil sie sich vorbereiten müssen, die Offenbarung zu empfangen, sie machen den Inhalt der Offenbarung. Sie wollen Erfahrungen, zu denen der Mensch nichts tut, gegenüber denen er ganz passiv bleibt. Sind solche Menschen außerdem noch unbekannt mit den einfachsten Anforderungen an wissenschaftliches Erfassen eines Tatbestandes, dann sehen sie in SeelenInhalten oder Seelen-Hervorbringungen, bei denen die Seele unter den Grad von bewußter Eigenbetätigung herabgedrückt ist, der im Sinneswahmehmen und im willkürlichen Tun vorliegt, eine objektive Offenbarung eines nicht sinnlichen Wesenhaften. Solche Seelen-Inhalte sind die visionären Erlebnisse, die mediumistischen Offenbarungen. – Was aber durch solche Offenbarungen zutage tritt, ist keine übersinnliche, es ist eine untersinnliche Welt. Das menschliche bewußte Wachleben verläuft nicht völlig in dem Leibe; es verläuft vor allem der bewußte Teil dieses Lebens an der Grenze zwischen Leib und physischer Außenwelt; so das Wahmehmungsleben, bei dem, was in den Sinnesorganen vorgeht, ebensogut das Hineinragen eines außerleiblichen Vorganges in den Leib ist wie ein Durchdringen dieses Vorganges vom Leibe aus; und so das Willensleben, das auf einem Hineinstellen des menschlichen Wesens in das Weltenwesen beruht, so daß, was im Menschen durch seinen Willen geschieht, zugleich Glied des Weltgeschehens ist. In diesem an der Leibesgrenze verlaufenden seelischen Erleben ist der Mensch in hohem Grade abhängig von seiner Leibesorganisation; aber es spielt die denkerische Betätigung in dieses Erleben hinein, und in dem Maße, als das der Fall ist, macht sich in Sinneswahmehmung und Wollen der Mensch vom Leibe unabhängig. Im visionären Erleben und im mediumistischen Hervorbringen tritt der Mensch völlig in die Abhängigkeit vom Leibe ein. Er schaltet aus seinem Seelenleben dasjenige aus, was ihn in Wahrnehmung und Wollen vom Leibe unabhängig macht. Und dadurch werden Seelen-Inhalte und Seelen-Hervorbringungen bloße Offenbarungen des Leibeslebens. Visionäres Erleben und mediumistisches Hervorbringen sind die Ergebnisse des Umstandes, daß der Mensch bei diesem Erleben und Hervorbringen mit seiner Seele weniger vom Leibe unabhängig ist als im gewöhnlichen Wahrnehmungs- und Willensleben. Bei dem Erleben des Übersinnlichen, das in dieser Schrift gemeint ist, geht nun die Entwickelung des Seelen-Erlebens gerade nach der entgegengesetzten Richtung gegenüber der visionären oder mediumistischen. Die Seele macht sich fortschreitend unabhängiger vom Leibe, als sie im Wahrnehmungs- und Willeusleben ist. Sie erreicht diejenige Unabhängigkeit, die im Erleben reiner Gedanken zu fassen ist, für eine viel breitere Seelenbetätigung.
[ 2 ] Für die hier gemeinte übersinnliche Seelenbetätigung ist es außerordentlich bedeutsam, in voller Klarheit das Erleben des reinen Denkens zu durchschauen. Denn im Grunde ist dieses Erleben selbst schon eine übersinnliche Seelenbetätigung. Nur eine solche, durch die man noch nichts Übersinnliches schaut. Man lebt mit dem reinen Denken im Übersinnlichen; aber man erlebt nur dieses auf eine übersinnliche Art; man erlebt noch nichts anderes Übersinnliches. Und das übersinnliche Erleben muß sein eine Fortsetzung desjenigen Seelen-Erlebens, das schon im Vereinigen mit dem reinen Denken erreicht werden kann. Deshalb ist es so bedeutungsvoll, diese Vereinigung richtig erfahren zu können. Denn von dem Verständnisse dieser Vereinigung aus leuchtet das Licht, das auch rechte Einsicht in das Wesen der übersinnlichen Erkenntnis bringen kann. Sobald das Seelen-Erleben unter die Bewußtseinsklarheit, die im Denken sich auslebt, heruntersinken würde, wäre sie für die wahre Erkenntnis der übersinnlichen Welt auf einem Irrwege. Sie würde erfaßt von den Leibesverrichtungen; was sie erlebt und hervorbringt, ist dann nicht Offenbarung des Übersinnlichen durch sie, sondern Leibesoffenbarung im Bereich der untersinnlichen Welt.
[ 3 ] Sobald die Seele mit ihren Erlebnissen in das Feld des Übersinnlichen eindringt, sind diese Erlebnisse von einer solchen Art, daß sich die sprachlichen Ausdrücke für sie nicht in so leichter Art finden lassen wie für die Erlebnisse im Bereiche der sinnlichen Welt. Man muß oftmals bei Beschreibungen des übersinnlichen Erlebens sich bewußt sein, daß gewissermaßen die Entfernung des sprachlichen Ausdrucks von dem ausgedrückten wirklichen Tatbestande eine größere ist als im physischen Erleben. Man muß sich ein Verständnis dafür erwerben, daß mancher Ausdruck wie eine Verbildlichung in zarter Weise auf das nur hinweist, auf das er sich bezieht. So ist es auf Seite 22 dieser Schrift gesagt: «Ursprünglich werden nämlich alle Regeln und Lehren der Geisteswissenschaft in einer sinnbildlichen Zeichensprache gegeben.» Und auf Seite 56 f. mußte von einem «bestimmten Schriftsystem» gesprochen werden. Es kann nun leicht jemandem beikommen, solche Schrift in einer ähnlichen Art lernen zu wollen, wie man Lautzeichen und deren Zusammenfügungen für die Schrift einer gewöhnlichen physischen Sprache erlernt. Nun muß allerdings gesagt werden: es hat gegeben und gibt geisteswissenschaftliche Schulen und Vereinigungen, welche im Besitze symbolischer Zeichen sind, durch die sie übersinnliche Tatbestände zum Ausdruck bringen. Und wer in die Bedeutung dieser Sinnbilder eingeweiht wird, der hat dadurch ein Mittel, sein Seelen-Erleben zu den in Frage kommenden übersinnlichen Wirklichkeiten hinzulenken. Aber ein für das übersinnliche Erleben Wesentliches ist vielmehr, daß im Laufe eines solchen übersinnlichen Erlebens, wie es durch die Verwirklichung des Inhaltes dieser Schrift von der Seele erreicht werden kann, diese Seele in der Anschauung des Übersinnlichen die Offenbarung einer solchen Schrift durch ihre eigene Erfahrung gewinnt. Das Übersinnliche sagt der Seele etwas, das sich diese in verbildlichende Zeichen übersetzen muß, damit sie es vollbewußt überschauen kann. Es kann gesagt werden: was in dieser Schrift mitgeteilt ist, das kann von jeder Seele verwirklicht werden. Und im Laufe der Verwirklichung, den sich nach den gemachten Angaben die Seele selbst bestimmen kann, stellen sich die Ergebnisse ein, die beschrieben sind. Man nehme doch ein solches Buch, wie dieses ist, wie ein Gespräch, das der Verfasser mit dem Leser führt. Wenn gesagt ist: der Geheimschüler bedürfe der persönlichen Anweisung, so fasse man dies doch so auf, daß das Buch selbst eine solche persönliche Anweisung ist. In früheren Zeiten gab es Gründe, solche persönlichen Anweisungen dem mündlichen Geheim-Unterrichte vorzubehalten; gegenwärtig sind wir auf einer Entwickelungsstufe der Menschheit angelangt, in der das geisteswissenschaftliche Erkennen eine viel größere Verbreitung erfahren muß als früher. Es muß in ganz anderem Maße jedem zugänglich sein als in alter Zeit. Da tritt eben das Buch an die Stelle der früheren mündlichen Unterweisung. Der Glaube, daß man durchaus über das in dem Buche Gesagte hinaus noch eine persönliche Unterweisung brauche, hat nur eine bedingte Richtigkeit. Der eine oder der andere kann ja freilich ein persönliches Nachhelfen brauchen, und ein solches kann ihm bedeutungsvoll sein. Aber es führte in die Irre, wenn man meinte, es gäbe Hauptsachen, die man im Buche nicht finde. Man findet sie, wenn man recht und namentlich wenn man vollständig liest.
[ 4 ] Die Schilderungen dieses Buches nehmen sich so aus, als ob sie Anweisungen wären zum völligen Anderswerden des ganzen Menschen. Wer sie richtig liest, wird aber finden, daß sie nichts anderes sagen wollen, als in welcher inneren Seelenverfassung ein Mensch sein muß in denjenigen Augenblicken seines Lebens, in denen er der übersinnlichen Welt gegenüberstehen will. Diese Seelenverfassung entwickelt er als eine zweite Wesenheit in sich; und die gesunde andere Wesenheit läuft in der alten Weise ihren Gang fort. Er weiß beide Wesenheiten in Vollbewußtheit auseinanderzuhalten; er weiß sie in rechter Art miteinander in Wechselwirkung zu setzen. Er macht sich nicht dadurch für das Leben unbrauchbar und untüchtig, daß er Interesse und Geschicklichkeit für dieses verliert und «den ganzen Tag Geistesforscher ist». Allerdings muß gesagt werden, daß die Erlebnisweise in der übersinnlichen Welt ihr Licht auf das ganze Wesen des Menschen ausstrahlen wird; aber dies kann nicht in einer von dem Leben ablenkenden Art sein, sondern in einer dieses Leben tüchtiger, fruchtbarer machenden Weise. – Daß trotzdem die Schilderung so gehalten werden mußte, wie es der Fall ist, das rührt davon her, daß allerdings jeder auf das Übersinnliche gerichtete Erkenntnisvorgang den ganzen Menschen in Anspruch nimmt, so daß in dem Augenblicke, in dem der Mensch an einen solchen Erkenntnisvorgang hingegeben ist, er dies mit seinem ganzen Wesen sein muß. Soviel der Farbenwahmehmungsvorgang nur die Einzelheit des Auges mit seiner Nervenfortsetzung in Anspruch nimmt, soviel nimmt ein übersinnlicher Erkenntnisvorgang den ganzen Menschen in Anspruch. Dieser wird «ganz Auge» oder «ganz Ohr». Weil dies so ist, deshalb sieht es so aus, daß, wenn man von der Bildung von übersinnlichen Erkenntnisvorgängen Mitteilung macht, man von einer Umwandlung des Menschen spräche; man meine, der gewöhnliche Mensch sei nichts Rechtes; er müsse etwas ganz anderes werden.
[ 5 ] Zu dem auf Seite 115 ff. «Über einige Wirkungen der Einweihung» Gesagten möchte ich noch etwas hinzufügen, was – mit einiger Abänderung – auch für andere Ausführungen dieses Buches gelten kann. – Es könnte wohl jemand auf den Gedanken kommen: wozu solche Beschreibung von bildhaften Ausgestaltungen übersinnlichen Erlebens; könnte man nicht dieses Erleben in Ideen ohne solche Versinnlichung schildern? Darauf muß erwidert werden: Es kommt für das Erleben der übersinnlichen Wirklichkeit in Betracht, daß der Mensch sich im Übersinnlichen selbst als ein Übersinnliches weiß. Ohne das Hinblicken auf seine eigene übersinnliche Wesenheit, deren Wirklichkeit in der hier gegebenen Schilderung der «Lotusblumen» und des «ätherischen Leibes» vollkommen in ihrer Art zur Offenbarung kommt, erlebte sich der Mensch im Übersinnlichen so, wie wenn er im Sinnlichen nur so drinnen stände, daß ihm die Dinge und Vorgänge um ihn her sich offenbarten, er aber von seinem eigenen Leibe nichts wüßte. Was er in «Seelenleib» und «Ätherleib» als seine übersinnliche Gestaltung schaut, das macht, daß er seiner selbst bewußt im Übersinnlichen steht, wie er durch die Wahrnehmung seines Sinnesleibes seiner selbst bewußt in der Sinnenwelt steht.
Afterword to the eighth to eleventh thousand
[ 1 ] The path to supersensible knowledge, which is characterized in this writing, leads to a spiritual experience to which it is of particular importance that those who strive for it do not indulge in any deceptions or misunderstandings about it. And it is natural for man to deceive himself about what is in question here. One of the deceptions, a particularly serious one, arises when the whole field of soul experience, which is the subject of true spiritual science, is so displaced that it appears to belong to the realm of superstition, visionary dreaming, mediumism and many other degenerations of human striving. This shift often stems from the fact that people who, in their way of striving for genuine knowledge, want to find a way into the supersensible reality and who in doing so fall into the aforementioned degenerations, are confused with those who want to follow the path outlined in this book. What is experienced by the human soul on the path meant here is definitely a purely spiritual-soul experience. It is only possible to live through such experiences if the human being can also make himself as free and independent of bodily life for other inner experiences as he is in the experience of ordinary consciousness, when he makes thoughts about what is perceived externally or what is desired, felt, willed internally, which do not originate from what is perceived, felt, willed itself. There are people who do not believe in the existence of such thoughts at all. They believe that man cannot think anything that he does not draw from perception or from his bodily inner life. And all thoughts are, so to speak, only shadow images of perceptions or inner experiences. Whoever claims this only does so because he has never brought himself to the ability to experience with his soul the pure, intrinsically based life of thought. But for those who have experienced this, it has become an experience that wherever thinking prevails in the life of the soul, to the extent that this thinking permeates other soul activities, the human being is engaged in an activity in the creation of which his body is uninvolved. in the ordinary life of the soul, thinking is almost always connected with other soul activities: Perceiving, feeling, willing and so on. These other activities come about through the body. But thinking plays a role in them. And to the extent that it plays a part, something takes place in the human being and through the human being in which the body is not involved. People who deny this cannot get beyond the deception that arises from the fact that they always observe the activity of thinking united with other activities. But in the inner experience, one can psychically rouse oneself to experience the mental part of the inner life separately from everything else. One can detach something from the scope of the soul life that consists only in pure thoughts. In thoughts that exist in themselves, from which everything is eliminated that gives perception or bodily conditioned inner life. Such thoughts reveal themselves through themselves, through what they are, as a spiritual, a supersensible being. And the soul, which unites with such thoughts by excluding all perception, all remembering, all other inner life during this union, knows itself with thinking in a supersensible realm and experiences itself outside the body. For the person who understands this whole situation, the question can no longer come into consideration: is there an experience of the soul in a supersensible element outside the body? For him it would mean denying what he knows from experience. For him there is only the question: what prevents people from recognizing such a certain fact? And to this question he finds the answer that the fact in question is one that does not reveal itself unless the person first puts himself in such a state of mind that he can receive the revelation. Now at first people become suspicious when they themselves are first supposed to do something purely psychologically so that something independent of them is revealed to them. They believe because they have to prepare themselves to receive the revelation, they make the content of the revelation. They want experiences to which man does nothing, to which he remains completely passive. If, in addition, such people are still unfamiliar with the simplest requirements of scientific comprehension of a fact, then they see in soul-contents or soul-productions, in which the soul is depressed below the degree of conscious self-activity that is present in sensory perception and in arbitrary action, an objective revelation of a non sensory being. Such soul-contents are the visionary experiences, the mediumistic revelations. - But what comes to light through such revelations is not a supersensible, it is a sub-sensible world. Human conscious waking life does not take place entirely in the body; it is above all the conscious part of this life that takes place on the boundary between the body and the physical outer world; thus the life of perception, in which what takes place in the sense organs is just as much the carrying into the body of an extra-bodily process as a penetration of this process from the body; and thus the life of the will, which is based on a placing of the human being into the world being, so that what happens in man through his will is at the same time a member of world events. In this psychic experience, which runs along the boundary of the body, man is highly dependent on his bodily organization; but mental activity plays a part in this experience, and to the extent that this is the case, man makes himself independent of the body in sense perception and volition. In visionary experience and in mediumistic production, the human being becomes completely dependent on the body. He eliminates from his soul life that which makes him independent of the body in perception and volition. As a result, soul contents and soul productions become mere revelations of bodily life. Visionary experience and mediumistic production are the results of the fact that man is less independent of the body in this experience and production with his soul than in the ordinary life of perception and will. In the experience of the supersensible, which is meant in this writing, the development of the soul-experience now goes exactly in the opposite direction to the visionary or mediumistic one. The soul becomes progressively more independent of the body than it is in the perceptual and volitional life. It achieves the independence that can be grasped in the experience of pure thoughts for a much broader soul activity.
[ 2 ] For the supersensible soul activity meant here, it is extraordinarily important to see through the experience of pure thought with complete clarity. For basically this experience itself is already a supersensible activity of the soul. Only one through which one does not yet see anything supersensible. One lives with pure thinking in the supersensible; but one only experiences this in a supersensible way; one does not yet experience anything else supersensible. And the supersensible experience must be a continuation of that soul-experience which can already be achieved in union with pure thinking. That is why it is so important to be able to experience this union correctly. For it is from the understanding of this union that the light shines which can also bring right insight into the nature of supersensible knowledge. As soon as the soul-experience would sink below the clarity of consciousness, which lives itself out in thinking, it would be on a wrong path for the true knowledge of the supersensible world. It would be seized by the bodily activities; what it experiences and produces is then not a revelation of the supersensible through it, but a revelation of the body in the realm of the sub-sensible world.
[ 3 ] As soon as the soul penetrates the field of the supersensible with its experiences, these experiences are of such a nature that the linguistic expressions for them cannot be found as easily as for the experiences in the realm of the sensual world. When describing supersensible experiences, one must often be aware that the distance of the linguistic expression from the real facts expressed is, so to speak, greater than in physical experience. One must acquire an understanding of the fact that many an expression, like a visualization, only delicately points to that to which it refers. Thus it is said on page 22 of this book: "Originally all the rules and teachings of spiritual science are given in a symbolic language of signs." And on page 56 f. it was necessary to speak of a "certain writing system". It is now easy for someone to want to learn such writing in a similar way as one learns phonetic symbols and their combinations for the writing of an ordinary physical language. It must be said, however, that there have been and still are schools and associations of spiritual science which are in possession of symbolic signs through which they express supersensible facts. And whoever is initiated into the meaning of these symbols has a means of directing his soul experience towards the supersensible realities in question. But what is essential for the supersensible experience is rather that in the course of such a supersensible experience, as it can be achieved by the soul through the realization of the contents of this writing, this soul gains the revelation of such a writing through its own experience in the contemplation of the supersensible. The supersensible tells the soul something which it must translate into visualizing signs so that it can fully consciously comprehend it. It can be said: what is communicated in this writing can be realized by every soul. And in the course of the realization, which the soul can determine for itself according to the information given, the results described occur. Take a book such as this as a conversation that the author has with the reader. When it is said that the secret disciple needs personal instruction, take this to mean that the book itself is such personal instruction. In earlier times there were reasons for reserving such personal instruction for secret oral teaching; at present we have reached a stage in the development of mankind in which spiritual-scientific knowledge must be much more widely disseminated than in former times. It must be accessible to everyone to a completely different extent than in the old days. The book takes the place of the earlier oral instruction. The belief that one needs personal instruction over and above what is said in the book is only conditionally correct. One or the other may, of course, need personal help, and such help may be meaningful to him. But it would be misleading to think that there are main things that cannot be found in the book. They can be found if one reads correctly and especially if one reads completely.
[ 4 ] The descriptions in this book appear as if they were instructions on how to completely change the whole person. Whoever reads them correctly, however, will find that they want to say nothing other than in what inner state of soul a person must be in those moments of his life in which he wants to face the supersensible world. He develops this constitution of soul as a second entity within himself; and the healthy other entity continues its course in the old way. He knows how to keep the two entities apart in full consciousness; he knows how to bring them into interaction with each other in the right way. He does not render himself useless and unfit for life by losing interest and skill for it and "being a spiritual researcher all day long". It must be said, however, that the way of experiencing the supersensible world will shed its light on the whole being of man; but this cannot be in a way that distracts from life, but in a way that makes this life more efficient, more fruitful. - The fact that the description has nevertheless had to be kept as it is, is due to the fact that every process of cognition directed towards the supersensible takes up the whole man, so that at the moment in which man is given over to such a process of cognition, he must be this with his whole being. As much as the color perception process only takes up the individuality of the eye with its nerve development, so much does a supersensible cognitive process take up the whole human being. This becomes "all eye" or "all ear". Because this is so, it appears that when one speaks of the formation of supersensible cognitive processes, one is speaking of a transformation of man; one thinks that the ordinary man is nothing real; he must become something completely different.
[ 5 ] To the article on page 115 ff. I would like to add something to what has already been said about "Some effects of initiation", which - with some modification - can also apply to other statements in this book. - Someone might well come up with the thought: why such a description of pictorial formations of supersensible experience; could one not describe this experience in ideas without such sensualization? To this must be replied: For the experience of the supersensible reality it comes into consideration that man knows himself in the supersensible as a supersensible. Without looking at his own supersensible being, the reality of which is revealed completely in its own way in the description of the "lotus flowers" and the "etheric body" given here, man would experience himself in the supersensible as if he were only standing in the sensible in such a way that the things and processes around him were revealed to him, but he would know nothing of his own body. What he sees in the "soul body" and "etheric body" as his supersensible formation makes him conscious of himself in the supersensible, just as he is conscious of himself in the sensory world through the perception of his sensory body.