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The Rudolf Steiner Archive

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148. Fifth Gospel (D. Osmond): Lecture V 06 Oct 1913, Oslo
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

For all these years there had been a very deep and intimate understanding between Jesus and this mother, a far closer understanding than prevailed between him and the other members of the family in the house. Jesus himself could have understood them but they, on their side, did not quite know what to make of him. Even in earlier years he had spoken with his mother about many of the impressions that had gradually taken shape within him.
And if I were to go forth and proclaim to men what I have heard as the altered voice of the Bath-Kol, if I were to disclose the secret of why it is that in their physical life men are no longer able to live in communion with the Mysteries, no human beings would understand. To-day it would all be distorted into demonic teaching. Even if I were to proclaim it, it would neither be heard nor understood.
148. Fifth Gospel I (Frank Thomas Smith): Lecture I 01 Oct 1913, Oslo
Translated by Frank Thomas Smith

And look at how these highly cultured people argued against Christianity, how they argued from the standpoint of Greek philosophy, and we have the impression that none of them understood the Christ-impulse. We see that Christianity was spread by bearers who understood nothing of the essence of Christianity; it was fought against by a high culture which could not understand what the Christ-impulse meant. It is noteworthy that Christianity entered the world in such a way that neither its adherents not its enemies understood its underlying spirit. Nevertheless those people had the strength in their souls to spread the Christ-impulse triumphantly throughout the world.
Firstly, the time is over in which Christ worked as I have characterized, and the time has come when people must understand and recognize him. Therefore it is necessary to answer the question: Why during the time which preceded ours, could the Christ-impulse spread without an understanding of it?
148. Fifth Gospel I (Frank Thomas Smith): Lecture II 02 Oct 1913, Oslo
Translated by Frank Thomas Smith

Now, however, they were as transformed: like people who had achieved a new state of mind or soul disposition, like people who had lost all the narrow restrictions, all the egotism of life, who had gained an infinitely wide heart and all-embracing tolerance, a deeply heartfelt understanding of all that is human on earth. They could also express themselves so that everyone present could understand them.
But those people who experienced the transformation, who had been awakened by the cosmic spirit of love, those people felt in themselves a new understanding for what had acted in common in their souls, but which they had until then not understood. Now, in that instant, understanding of what actually happened on Golgotha appeared before their minds' eye.
That led to my speaking to you for the first time about these things. When I say “overcoming”, please understand the word as it is meant. I explicitly request that what I have to say on this occasion be understood as a stimulation, as something which in the future will be explained much better and more precisely.
148. Fifth Gospel I (Frank Thomas Smith): Lecture III 03 Oct 1913, Oslo
Translated by Frank Thomas Smith

We must understand the Mystery of Golgotha itself as an earthly birth—that is, the death of Jesus as the earthly birth of Christ.
What is expressed in the human physical body can be understood in this way. What the human being on earth becomes is a reflection of the cosmos. The reverse is the case with the Christ-Being.
These are things we must keep in mind if we want to understand the full meaning of the Christ-Impulse, as it will have to be understood in the future in order for humanity to advance in its path of evolution and culture.
148. Fifth Gospel I (Frank Thomas Smith): Lecture IV 05 Oct 1913, Oslo
Translated by Frank Thomas Smith

Yes, he also discovered that the demonic powers often merged with the faithful who were attending the services. It is not difficult to understand why these things are not described in the other gospels. And it is only now possible to speak about them in the confines of our spiritual movement, for human souls can only now, in our times, understand the enormously profound experiences which played out in the young Jesus of Nazareth.
A very strict rule for our present day mentality – but what was understandable was that the Essene could care for the needy with the goods belonging to the Order, except those who belonged to his own family.
Since that experience, Jesus and the Essenes could no longer understand themselves well. For something lived in Jesus' soul about which he couldn't speak to the Essenes.
148. Fifth Gospel I (Frank Thomas Smith): Lecture V 06 Oct 1913, Oslo
Translated by Frank Thomas Smith

The scene was of a conversation which Jesus had with his mother, with that person who had been his mother for many years through the consolidation of both families. An intimate and excellent understanding existed with her, a much better understanding than existed with the other family members who lived in the house; that is, he could get along well with them, but they didn't really understand him.
He renewed the original Jewish wisdom, for those who understood him. Hillel was a wandering teacher of wisdom; he wandered among the Jewish people like a kind of new Messiah.
It descended into those three bodies, as they had become under the influence of the thirty years of life which I have already described. Therefore the Christ-Being was unbiased in respect to his first earthly experiences.
148. The Fifth Gospel II (Frank Thomas Smith): Lecture XVII 17 Dec 1913, Cologne
Translated by Frank Thomas Smith

Just as a ball continues to roll on for a time under its own inertia, so does such a person continue to live on through the strength which lives within him.
Whereas his stepmother previously had shown little understanding for him, now she showed more understanding for the great pain he bore within him. Then other experiences followed from his twenty-fourth to his thirtieth year, during which he found ever more understanding from his stepmother, although things were still somewhat difficult.
Whoever does not wish to consider the idea that something so special happened at that moment in the evolution of humanity will find human evolution difficult to understand.
148. The Fifth Gospel II (Frank Thomas Smith): Lecture XVIII 18 Dec 1913, Cologne
Translated by Frank Thomas Smith

In general terms, I described how such reading in the Akasha Chronical is to be understood in articles in the magazine “Lucifer-Gnosis” which appeared under the title “From the Akasha Chronicle”.
You will not misunderstand this, for you are prepared by spiritual science to understand that expressions have a different sense and feeling value when used to characterize the higher worlds.
For a long time he could act only in the unconscious; then he had to act through what was understood until that time. But it will be ever more necessary for man to learn to understand him, the Christ, who through the bodies of Jesus of Nazareth has entered the earth's aura and humanity's development.
148. The Fifth Gospel III: First Berlin Lecture 21 Oct 1913, Berlin

In the fourth post-Atlantean period, the human soul was in a state of development in which this understanding of the Mystery of Golgotha, this direct spiritual understanding, was closed to it precisely because of its state of development.
With the advent of the new period, we see quite clearly, even as it announces itself, how a new lack of understanding is added to the old lack of understanding, indeed, a lack of understanding that goes even further than the old one.
The time of non-understanding must give way to the time of first understanding. This is what I wanted to suggest with today's reflections and what we will continue with in the next reflections.
148. The Fifth Gospel III: Second Berlin Lecture 04 Nov 1913, Berlin

Through occult study, undertaken in the appropriate way, it is possible in our time to learn, as it were, what might be called the Fifth Gospel.
There we see him arriving at a pagan place of worship, a pagan place of worship such as was built to the pagan gods under this or that name in Asia, Africa and Europe. It was one of those places of worship whose ceremonies were reminiscent of the way in which they were also practiced in the mysteries, but there they were practiced with understanding, whereas in these pagan places of worship they had often degenerated into a kind of external ceremony.
This conversation with the mother was decisive for what he now undertook: the path to the one with whom he had already entered into a kind of relationship through his relationship with the Essene order, which he undertook as a walk to John the Baptist.

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