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The Rudolf Steiner Archive

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133. Earthly and Cosmic Man: Introductory Lecture. Winter Session 23 Oct 1911, Berlin
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

In short, where there is no understanding of the Resurrection, there can be no understanding of Christianity! On the other hand it must also be remembered that the intellect as such, whether directed to Spiritual or to Natural Science, is incapable of approaching subjects like the Resurrection.
Every one who is acquainted with the sciences knows that there are matters which can be disputed; but there are others which cannot be disputed—and there, if someone holds a contrary opinion, it can only be said that he does not understand the point at issue. Now if we say: “You do not understand this”—we may be considered extremely arrogant!
Our reply can only be: “You do not understand. True knowledge of the Christ Being reveals that He is a Being Who can appear once, and once only, in a body of flesh.”
133. Earthly and Cosmic Man: Evidences of Bygone Ages in Modern Civilisation 19 Mar 1912, Berlin
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

The mission of the Post-Atlantean epoch was to develop in man an understanding of Earth-existence proper, of all that can be acquired by the development of the body as a physical instrument.
Men of the present day will often stand amazed at such things and will only begin to understand them when they realise that anyone who is cognisant of the more intimate connections of human evolution, accepts them as self-evident. Understanding of Spiritual Science is not furthered by pedantic demands for “logical proof”; proof, after all, is useful only to those who are willing to believe what is asserted; it is useful only to those who can believe that it is proof.
133. Earthly and Cosmic Man: “Chance” and Present-Day Consciousness 26 Mar 1912, Berlin
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

Man himself is involved in this “chance” and much of what he calls his destiny is rooted in the laws underlying it. What is it, then, that is needed? We will now try to answer this question. Something must take place of which the exoteric world has absolutely no idea.
Men must recognise that in the course of human evolution a point was once reached which must now be understood in a new sense, and in full consciousness. Significant allusion is made to it in the First Chapter of the Gospel of St.
There must come to men—free from all preconceived thoughts—a new understanding of where the might of the Christ-Impulse lies, and of the heights to which the Christ-Impulse can raise them.
133. Earthly and Cosmic Man: The Forces of the Human Soul and Their Inspirers 23 Apr 1912, Berlin
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

In what is the most sacred possession of a people, we learn to understand the speech of the Folk-Soul! So, too, it can be the whole world over, when we realise what must be the very root—nerve of theosophical life.
Mutual understanding among the confessions of faith on the Earth and therewith mutual harmony—that is the essence and core of theosophical teaching.
The task of Theosophy is to bring about mutual understanding between the religions on Earth which are founded upon Initiation. When this is understood, Theosophy* will live truly in the hearts of men; there will be no founding of new sects, no proclamations of new, physical prophets, for whom humanity no longer waits in that external sense.
133. Earthly and Cosmic Man: The Idea of Reincarnation and its Introduction into Western Culture 02 May 1912, Berlin
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

But through Spiritual Science and a deepened understanding, we realise that one and the same Being lived in the prophet Elijah and in John the Baptist. We add to our understanding of the single life a principle of knowledge already possessed by the East, only the East did not lay such emphasis upon the power and force inhering in the single personality.
2 This helps us to understand how the forces develop in the same soul from life to life, and to discern the effects of earlier causes.
133. Earthly and Cosmic Man: The Mission of the Earth 14 May 1912, Berlin
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

It must therefore never be forgotten that at the present stage of our existence it is not possible to understand the goals of much later phases of evolution and that a higher vantage-point must be reached if we are to understand the meaning of a far distant goal.
Because Homer and the Greeks knew that these Gods were Beings belonging to a period of evolution preceding that of the Earth—a period when the Beings who were then passing through their “human stage” under the conditions prevailing in existence, had not yet received into the life of soul the powers of wonder, compassion and conscience. It must be constantly remembered that the earlier planetary conditions through which the Earth has passed and in which such Beings as the Greek Gods underwent their human stage, were not there for the purpose of implanting “Wonder,” “Compassion,” and “Conscience” in the life of soul.
133. Earthly and Cosmic Man: The Signature of Human Evolution 20 May 1912, Berlin
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

For what, in reality, is a Greek Temple? We can only understand it in its whole form and structure, if we think of it as the dwelling-place of a living, invisible God who has come down to the physical plane.
But these mysterious and deeply symbolical buildings indicate in themselves that men must have undergone preparation before the architectural forms could help them to find the way to the Divine-Spiritual.
We are living in the age when the re-ascent must be undertaken consciously—whereas, to begin with, the Christ Impulse worked unconsciously in men. Our own epoch is a kind of recapitulation of the Egypto-Chaldean period.
133. Earthly and Cosmic Man: Consciousness, Memory, Karma 18 Jun 1912, Berlin
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

It will be my task today to speak of the nature and being of Man, in order that the next lecture may contribute to an understanding of the development of mankind as a whole. We will begin by considering something of primary and immediate importance in the life of the human being as he stands before us on the Earth.
These heritages have remained and are active in man. The human being in his whole nature can be understood only when we know that the first foundations of the physical body were laid during the ancient Saturn period; development proceeded through the Old Sun period and the Old Moon period, and the present form and structure of the human body did not unfold until the period of Earth-evolution proper.
Or rather, in the sense of Spiritual Science it would be better, instead of using the word “decay,” to say that it is given over to the element of universal Nature, for the dissolution or decay of the physical body to be observed outwardly is only illusion, maya. In reality, a great and mighty process underlies what is called the “dissolution” or “decay” of the human body. Whatever in man belongs to Nature passes over to Powers standing behind existence.
133. Earthly and Cosmic Man: Form-Creating Forces 20 Jun 1912, Berlin
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

We must therefore ask: What is the principle underlying the distinction to be made among the individual forms of men in the course of the evolution of humanity?
It is a fact that in ancient times men lived under external leaders and teachers, but even in those days, leadership was gradually becoming an inner concern.
It is very important to realise that the ancient wisdom exists and must be understood, that understanding of it can constantly increase if men's souls are open to the spiritual worlds and if they strive to grasp this wisdom with their powers of reason.
Earthly and Cosmic Man: Foreword
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

We discern the play of forces which preceded the sufferings of our present time, discharged itself with unparalleled fury in the world war and its aftermath and will burst out in tempests yet to come. We understand why this had to be, what failings will be forgiven, what demands made of us. A great and impressive tableau of history unrolls from the precision given to details otherwise ignored and from the vast cosmic-human background against which the life of man stands out in bold relief.
He still saw hope of being able, through the new impulse, to rescue the Theosophical Society, too, from lapsing into the rigidity of dogma, to imbue it with fresh forces and enrich its very defective understanding of the Mysteries of Christianity. Without overthrowing anything at all, gradually laying stone upon stone, he created the basis for this understanding.
The warnings given in this connection may not always be understood by the reader today. In the main they were connected with the occult despotism—for so indeed it may be called—which took the form of the announcement of the coming of a World-Saviour in the flesh—to whom they dared to give the name of Christ.

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