Lesson FS 2.1.
Introduction
The Sophia Institute was founded in 2000 when a group of parents and teachers requested a foundation course in Anthroposophy and Waldorf Education in Viroqua, Wisconsin (USA). Conrad Rehbach, a certified Waldorf teacher with many years of teaching experience in Waldorf grade school teaching, Waldorf High School teaching and therapeutic work in the Camphill Movement, founded the Sophia Institute Foundation Courses in Anthroposophy and the Arts. Within a year's time the first group of students graduated from the course. Over the years a diverse faculty has contributed to the growth of the programs including Waldorf Teacher Certificate Programs, Foundation Courses Programs, Introductory Courses and Summer Intensives Courses, which became successful programs attracting students from a near and far, and preparing them for Waldorf teaching and/or deepening their understanding of Waldorf pedagogy and Anthroposophy.
The Sophia Institute and especially the Foundation Courses in Anthroposophy were originally developed primarily with an eye towards those individuals who want to become Waldorf grades teachers. Over the years of offering and teaching these courses, we encountered a wide variety of interests, and many of the students were early childhood or Kindergarten teachers, parents of students in the Waldorf schools, grades teachers, high school teachers, people interested in bio-dynamic farming, administrators, fundraisers, development coordinators, etc. All had a deep interest in learning more or deepening their understanding of Anthroposophy. As we believe in and practice a collaborative learning style, where the group of students, together with their teachers forms a temporary learning community, the contributions that each individual brings to the learning community is an integral part of the learning experience, and determines the course’s direction. The Sophia Institute Courses and the other activities of the Sophia Institute have been influenced and shaped by this process of collaboration. Another inspiration to the creation and practice of the Sophia Institute and its work has been given by Tamara Slayton (1950 – 2003), Waldorf educator, author, and workshop leader. We were fortunate to learn from Tamara, and regard her as one of our guides in this work of bringing about temporary collaborative learning communities, that strive towards the experience of spiritual insights in a participatory and inclusive learning style both in adult education and in teaching children. The Sophia Institute courses are designed to meet the needs of those individuals who want to develop their artistic abilities, and acquaint themselves with, or deepen their understanding of the basic world-view of Anthroposophy brought by Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925). The achievements inspired by Anthroposophy can be seen today throughout the modern world. It is attracting those people who wish to work out of new impulses in the fields of agriculture, the arts, education, curative education, social therapy, natural sciences, and medicine. The Foundation Courses and Waldorf Certificate Program are similar to the Foundation Courses and Waldorf Certificate Programs offered by the other Waldorf Teacher Training Centers in the USA and Canada and prepare students to teach in Waldorf Schools, Waldorf Kindergarten and Pre-Schools, and Waldorf High Schools. Our graduates receive a certificate and have found work in Waldorf schools or other Anthroposophical organizations. Foundation Studies students have also transferred successfully into other teacher training programs and have received full credit for the courses taken at Sophia Institute. The completed Foundation Courses (or equivalent) are required for enrollment in most Waldorf Teacher Training programs. The Foundation Studies Courses are designed to meet the needs of those individuals who want to develop their artistic abilities, and acquaint themselves with, or deepen their understanding of the basic world-view of Anthroposophy brought by Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925). The achievements inspired by Anthroposophy can be seen today throughout the modern world. It is attracting those people who wish to work out of new impulses in the fields of agriculture, the arts, education, curative education, social therapy, natural sciences, and medicine. Foundation Studies in Anthroposophy and the Arts, while providing a background for those wishing to become teachers in Waldorf Schools, also offers the same opportunity to others who are interested in learning more about how they may work in the world, guided by a foundation in Anthroposophy. In the Foundation Studies Courses broad themes of the essential nature of the human being and human development are taken up on many different levels. 
Recommended reading:
"Theosophy" by Rudolf Steiner "Phases" by Bernard Lievegoed |
Recommended Reading List
Please find the Recommended Reading List for the Foundation Studies Courses Program (Semester 1 and 2) here.
"Theosophy" by Rudolf Steiner (Table of Contents)
Table of Contents:
Preface Preface to the Revised English Edition Introduction Chapter 1. The Essential Nature of Man 1. The Corporeal Nature of Man 2. The Soul Nature of Man 3. The Spiritual Nature of Man 4. Body, Soul and Spirit Chapter 2. Re-embodiment of the Spirit and Destiny Chapter 3. The Three Worlds 1. The Soul World 2. The Soul in the Soul World After Death 3. The Spiritland 4. The Spirit in Spiritland After Death 5. The Physical World and its Connection with the Soul and Spiritland 6. Thought Forms and the Human Aura Chapter 4. The Path of Knowledge Tasks and Assignments for Lesson FS 2.1.
" ... Anthroposophy should not be considered a theory or mere science, nor as knowledge in the ordinary sense. It is rather something that grows in our souls from mere knowledge and theory into immediate life, into an elixir of life. In this way, Anthroposophy not only provides us with knowledge, but we receive forces that help us in our ordinary lives during physical existence as well as in the total life that we spend during physical existence and non-physical existence between death and a new birth. The more we experience Anthroposophy bringing us strength, support, and life-renewing energies, the more do we understand it." (Rudolf Steiner, Vienna, February 08, 1912)
In this second part of the online Foundation Course the focus is on studying the book "Theosophy" by Rudolf Steiner, and the quest for gaining or deepening the understanding of the world-view of Anthroposophy and the psychological insights of this world-view. An in-depth study of the material will be necessary. You will be guided through this study via the exercises and assignments given in this course, and the feedback you will receive when submitting your work or questions and concerns. The text of the book "Theosophy" will be given to you in installments as you proceed from lesson to lesson. You may choose to print out the text, or you may want to purchase a copy of the book "Theosophy" for your study. It is readily available either from SteinerBooks or other online and local bookstores. (Another option is to order the complete text of "Theosophy" as a study book/study material from Sophia Institute at a nominal cost. Please contact Sophia Institute for that option. ) In this lesson 1 you will be asked to delve deeply into the work by Rudolf Steiner, and the first tasks will bring you close to all the basic ideas and concepts given in this work, the book "Theosophy". In case you have questions concerning Rudolf Steiner, please refer back to the study at the beginning of the Foundation Course Part 1 Semester 1, especially the first lessons/sessions, where an in-depth study of the significance of Rudolf Steiner and his place in history has been given. Alternatively, you might want to find additional resources or biographies of Rudolf Steiner to turn to. For lesson 1, please study the prefaces and introduction of "Theosophy" by Rudolf Steiner. (See text below). After studying the material, please turn to and work with the following questions and tasks. Tasks/questions for lesson 1: 1. Give a summary - in your own words - of the prefaces. 2. Comment on the content of the prefaces. 3. Give a summary - in your own words - of the introduction. 4. After reading and studying the prefaces and the introduction, please write a paragraph or two about what your expectations are concerning this study material i.e. the book "Theosophy" and related works by Steiner. 5. Explain (as you would to a fellow student) why the book is titled "Theosophy" and not for instance "Anthroposophy." Please submit your completed assignment via the online submission form |
"Theosophy" by Rudolf Steiner
Study Material for this Lesson: Prefaces, Introduction
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Audio Recording of the Introduction
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From the Prefaces to the First, Second, and Third Editions
The purpose of this book is to give a description of some of the regions of the supersensible world. The reader who is only willing to admit the existence of the sensible world will look upon this description as merely an unreal production of the imagination. Whoever looks for paths that lead beyond this world of the senses, however, will soon learn to understand that human life only gains in worth and significance through insight into another world. He will not, as many fear, be estranged from the “real” world through this new power of vision because only through it does he learn to stand securely and firmly in this life and learns to know the causes of life. Without this power of vision he gropes like a blind man through their effects. Only through the understanding of the supersensible does the sensible “real” acquire meaning. A man therefore becomes more and not less fit for life through this understanding. Only he who understands life can become a truly practical man.
The author of this book describes nothing to which he cannot bear witness from experience — the kind of experience that belongs to these regions. Nothing will be described here that has not been personally experienced in this sense.
This book cannot be read in the customary manner of the present day. In certain respects every page, and even many sentences, will have to be worked out by the reader. This has been aimed at intentionally because only in this way can the book become to the reader what it ought to be. The one who merely reads it through will not have read it at all. Its truths must be experienced, lived. Only in this sense has spiritual science any value.
The book cannot be judged from the standpoint of science if the point of view adopted in forming such a judgment is not gained from the book itself. If the critic will adopt this point of view, he will certainly see that the presentation of the facts given in this book will in no way conflict with truly scientific methods. The author is satisfied that he has taken care not to come into conflict with his own scientific scrupulousness even by a single word.
Those who feel more drawn to another method of searching after the truths here set forth will find such a method in my Philosophy of Freedom. The lines of thought taken in these two books, though different, lead to the same goal. For the understanding of the one, the other is by no means necessary, although undoubtedly helpful to some persons.
Those who look for “ultimate” truths in this book will perhaps lay it aside unsatisfied. The primary intention of the author has been to present the fundamental truths underlying the whole domain of spiritual science. It lies in the very nature of man to ask at once about the beginning and the end of the world, the purpose of existence, and the nature and being of God. Anyone, however, who looks not for mere phrases and concepts of the intellect, but for a real understanding of life, knows that in a work that deals with the elements of spiritual knowledge, things may not be said that belong to the higher stages of wisdom. It is indeed only through an understanding of these elements that it becomes clear how higher questions should be asked. In another work forming a continuation of this one, namely in the author's Occult Science, an Outline, further particulars will be found on the subject here dealt with.
In the preface to a second edition of this book the following supplementary remarks were inserted: Anyone who at the present time gives a description of supersensible facts ought to be quite clear on two points. The first is that the cultivation of supersensible knowledge is a necessity for our age; the other is that the intellectual and spiritual life of the day is full of ideas and feelings that make a description like this appear to many as an absolute chaos of fantastic notions and dreams. Knowledge of the supersensible is a necessity today because all that a man can learn through current methods about the world and life arouses in him numerous questions. Those can be answered only by means of supersensible truths. We ought not to deceive ourselves with regard to the fact that the teaching concerning the fundamental truths of existence given within the intellectual and spiritual currents of today is for the deeply feeling soul a source, not of answer, but of questions about the great problems of the universe and of life. Some people may for a time hold firmly to the opinion that they can find a solution of the problems of existence within conclusions from strictly scientific facts, and within the deductions of this or that thinker of the day. But when the soul descends into those depths into which it must descend if it is to understand itself, what at first seemed to be an answer appears only as the incentive to the real question. An answer to this question does not merely have to satisfy human curiosity. On it depend the inner calm and completeness of the soul life. The attainment of such an answer does not satisfy merely the thirst for knowledge. It makes a man capable of practical work and fits him for the duties of life, while the lack of an answer to these questions lames his soul and finally his body also. In fact, the knowledge of the supersensible is not merely something that meets a theoretical requirement. It supplies a method for leading a truly practical life. It is just because of the nature of our present day intellectual life that study in the domain of spiritual knowledge is indispensable.
On the other hand it is an evident fact that many today reject most strongly what they most sorely need. Some people are so greatly influenced by theories built up on the basis of exact scientific experience that they cannot do otherwise than regard the contents of a book like this as a boundless absurdity. The exponent of supersensible truths is able to view such a fact entirely free from any illusions. People will certainly be prone to demand that he give irrefutable proofs for what he states, but they do not realize that in so doing they are the victims of a misconception. They demand, although unconsciously, not the proofs lying within the things themselves, but those that they personally are willing to recognize or are in a condition to recognize. The author of this book is sure that any person, taking his stand on the basis of the science of the present day, will find that it contains nothing that he will be unable to accept. He knows that all the requirements of modern science can be complied with, and for this very reason the method adopted here of presenting the facts of the supersensible world supplies its own justification. In fact, the way in which true modern science approaches and deals with a subject is precisely the one that is in full harmony with this presentation. Anyone who thinks thus will feel moved by many a discussion in a way described by Goethe's deeply true saying, “A false teaching does not offer any opening to refutation because it rests upon the conviction that the false is true.” Argument is fruitless with those who allow only such proofs to weigh with them as fit in with their own way of thinking. Those who know the true nature of what is called “proving” a matter see clearly that the human soul finds truth through other means than by argument. It is with these thoughts in mind that the author offers this book for publication.
Preface to the Revised English Edition
This book has been carefully and thoroughly revised by me for each new edition. The substance of the first edition remains, it is true, unaltered, but in certain parts I have sought to bring the mode of expression more into accord with the content of spiritual vision. I have especially endeavored to do this in the chapter on Re-Embodiment of the Spirit and Destiny (Karma).
Descriptions of the supersensible must be treated differently from descriptions of the sensible world. They appeal to the reader in a different way. They demand more from him and he must work with the author more intensely in thought while reading. The author needs his co-operation to a far higher degree than does one who writes descriptions drawn from the regions of the sensory world. Many critics will perhaps complain because I have made special efforts to comply with this demand in my description of the spiritual world. The spiritual world, however, has not the definite outlines of the physical, and if anyone were to represent it so as to give the impression that this was the case, he would be describing something untrue. In describing the spiritual world of facts, the style must be in accordance with the mobile, flowing character of that world.
Inner truth for descriptions of the spiritual world belongs alone to what is expressed in flowing, mobile ideas. The peculiar character of the spiritual world must be carried over into the ideas. If the reader applied the standard to which he is accustomed from descriptions of the sensory world, he will find it difficult to adapt himself to this different method of description.
It is by inner exertion of the soul that the human being is able to reach the supersensible world. That world would, indeed, have no value if it lay spread out wholly before this consciousness. It would then be in no way different from the sensuous world. Before it can be known, the longing must be present to find what lies more deeply hidden in existence than do the forces of the world perceived by the senses. This longing is one of the inner experiences that prepare the way for a knowledge of the supersensible world. Even as there can be no blossom without first the root, so supersensible knowledge has no true life without this longing.
It would, however, be a mistake to suppose that the ideas of the supersensible world arise as an illusion of this longing. The lungs do not create the air for which they long, neither does the human soul create out of its longing the ideas of the supersensible world. The soul has this longing because it is formed and built for the supersensible world, just as the lungs are constructed for air.
There may be those who say that this supersensible world can only have significance for such as already have the power to perceive it, but this is not so. There is no need to be a painter in order to feel the beauty of a painting, yet only a painter can paint it. In the same sense it is unnecessary to be a researcher in the supersensible in order to judge the truth of the results of supersensible research. It is only necessary to be a researcher in order to discover them. This is right in principle. In the last chapter of this book, however — and in detail in others of my books — the methods are given whereby it is possible for anyone to become a researcher in the supersensible world, and thus be in a position to test the results of such research. - Rudolf Steiner, April, 1922
Introduction
When in the autumn of 1813, Johann Gottlieb Fichte gave to the world as the ripe fruit of a life wholly devoted to the service of truth, his Introduction to the Science of Knowledge, he said at the very outset, “This doctrine presupposes an entirely new inner sense organ or instrument through which a new world is revealed having no existence for the ordinary man.” He then showed by a simile how incomprehensible this doctrine must be when judged by conception of the ordinary senses. “Think of a world of people born blind who, therefore, know only those objects and relations that exist through the sense of touch. Go among them, and speak to them of colors and the other relations that exist only through light and for the sense of sight. You will convey nothing to their minds, and this will be the more fortunate if they tell you so, for you will then quickly notice your mistake and, if unable to open their eyes, you will cease talking in vain . . . .”
Now those who speak about such things as Fichte does in this instance, often find themselves in the position of a normal man among those born blind. Yet these are things that relate to a man's true being and highest goal, and to believe it necessary “to cease talking in vain” would be to despair of humanity. We ought not to doubt for one moment the possibility of opening the eyes of every earnest person to these things. On this supposition all those have written and spoken who have felt within themselves that the inner sense-instrument had developed, thereby enabling them to know the true nature and being of man, which is generally hidden from the outer senses. Hence from the most ancient times such a hidden wisdom has been spoken of again and again. Those who have grasped some understanding of it feel just as sure of their possession as people with normal eyes feel sure of their ability to visualize color. For them this hidden wisdom requires no proof. They know also that this hidden wisdom requires no proof for anyone else to whom the “higher sense” has unfolded itself. They can speak to such a person as a traveler can speak about America to people who have themselves never seen that country but who can visualize it, for they would see all that he has seen were the opportunity to present itself to them.
It is not, however, only to researchers into the spiritual world that the observer of the supersensible has to speak. He must address his words to all men, because he has to give an account of things that concern all men. Indeed, he knows that without a knowledge of these things no one can, in the true sense of the word, be a human being. Thus, he speaks to all men because he knows there are different degrees of understanding for what he has to say. The feeling for truth and the power of understanding it are inherent in everyone, and he knows that even those who are still far from the moment in which they will acquire the ability to make their own spiritual research can bring a measure of understanding to meet him. He addresses himself first to this understanding that can flash forth in every healthy soul. He knows that in this understanding there is a force that must slowly lead to the higher degrees of knowledge. This feeling, which perhaps at first perceives nothing at all of what it is told, is itself the magician that opens the “eye of the spirit.” In darkness this feeling stirs. The soul sees nothing, but through this feeling it is seized by the power of truth. The truth then gradually draws nearer to the soul and opens the higher sense in it. In one person it may take a longer, in another a shorter time. Everyone, however, who has patience and endurance reaches this goal, for although not every physical eye can be operated on, every spiritual eye can be opened. When it will be opened is only a question of time.
Erudition and scientific training are not prerequisite conditions for the unfolding of this higher sense. It can develop in the unsophisticated person just as in the renowned scientist. Indeed, what is often called at the present time the only true science can, for the attainment of this goal, be frequently a hindrance rather than a help because this science considers real only what is accessible to the ordinary senses. Its merits in regard to the knowledge of that reality may be ever so great, yet when science declares that what is necessary and a blessing for itself shall also be authoritative for all human knowledge, it thereby creates a mass of prejudices that close the approach to higher realities.
The objection is often made to what has just been said that insurmountable limits have been once and forever set to man's knowledge, and since a man cannot overstep these limits, all knowledge must be rejected that does not take them into account. Furthermore, the one who presumes to make assertions about things, which for many stand proved as lying beyond the limits of man's capacity for knowledge, is looked upon as being highly immodest. In making such objections the fact is entirely disregarded that a development of the human powers of knowledge must precede the higher knowledge. What lies beyond the limits of knowledge before such a development takes place is, after the awakening of faculties slumbering in every man, entirely within the realm of knowledge.
One point in this connection must not be neglected. It might be said, “Of what use is it to speak to people about things for which their powers of knowledge are not yet awakened and are therefore still closed to them?” This is really the wrong way to view the matter. Certain powers are required to discover the things referred to, but if after having been discovered they are made known, every person can understand them who is willing to bring to them unprejudiced logic and a healthy sense of truth. In this book the things made known are wholly of a kind that must produce the impression that through them the riddles of human life and the phenomena of the world can be satisfactorily approached. This impression will be produced upon everyone who permits thought, unclouded by prejudice, and a feeling for truth, free and without reservation, to work within him. Put yourself for a moment in the position of asking, “If the things asserted here are true, do they afford a satisfying explanation of life?” You will find that the life of every man supplied a confirmation.
In order to be a teacher in these higher regions of existence it is by no means sufficient to have simply developed the sense for them. To that end science is just as necessary as it is for the teacher's calling in the world of ordinary reality. Higher seeing alone does not make a knower in the spiritual any more than healthy sense organs make a scholar in the ream of sensible realities. Because in truth all reality, the lower as well as the higher spiritual, are only two sides of one and the same fundamental being, anyone who is ignorant in the lower branches of knowledge will as a rule remain ignorant in the higher. This fact creates a feeling of immeasurable responsibility in the person who, through a spiritual call, feels himself summoned to speak about the spiritual regions of existence. It imposes upon him humility and reserve. This should deter no one — not even those whose other circumstances of life afford them no opportunity for the study of ordinary science — from occupying himself with the higher truths. Everyone can fulfill his task as a man without understanding anything of botany, zoology, mathematics and the other sciences. He cannot, however, in the full sense of the word, be a human being without having come in some way or other nearer to an understanding of the nature and destination of man as revealed through the knowledge of the supersensible.
The highest to which a man is able to look, he calls the Divine, and he somehow must think of the highest destiny as being in connection with this Divinity. The wisdom, therefore, that reaches out beyond the sensible and reveals to him his own being and with it his final goal, may well be called divine wisdom or theosophy. To the study of the spiritual process in human life and in the cosmos, the term spiritual science may be given. When, as in this book, one extracts from this spiritual science those special results that have reference to the spiritual core of man's being then the expression theosophy may be employed to designate this domain because it has been employed for centuries in this way.
From this point of view there will be sketched in this book an outline of the theosophical conception of the universe. The writer of it will bring forward nothing that is not a fact for him in the same sense that an experience of the outer world is a fact for eyes and ears and the ordinary intelligence. The concern here is with experiences that become accessible to everyone who is determined to tread the path of knowledge described in a later chapter of this book. We take the right attitude towards the things of the supersensible world when we assume that sound thinking and feeling are capable of understanding everything of true knowledge that emerges from the higher worlds. Further, when we start from this understanding and therewith lay down a firm foundation, we have also made a great step forward towards, “seeing” for ourselves, even though in order to attain this, other things must be added also. We lock and bolt the door to the true higher knowledge, however, when we despise this road and are determined to penetrate the higher worlds only in some other way. To have decided to recognize higher worlds only when we have seen them is a hindrance in the way of this very seeing itself. The determination to understand first through sound thinking what later can be seen, furthers that seeing. It conjures forth important powers of the soul that lead to this seeing of the seer.
The purpose of this book is to give a description of some of the regions of the supersensible world. The reader who is only willing to admit the existence of the sensible world will look upon this description as merely an unreal production of the imagination. Whoever looks for paths that lead beyond this world of the senses, however, will soon learn to understand that human life only gains in worth and significance through insight into another world. He will not, as many fear, be estranged from the “real” world through this new power of vision because only through it does he learn to stand securely and firmly in this life and learns to know the causes of life. Without this power of vision he gropes like a blind man through their effects. Only through the understanding of the supersensible does the sensible “real” acquire meaning. A man therefore becomes more and not less fit for life through this understanding. Only he who understands life can become a truly practical man.
The author of this book describes nothing to which he cannot bear witness from experience — the kind of experience that belongs to these regions. Nothing will be described here that has not been personally experienced in this sense.
This book cannot be read in the customary manner of the present day. In certain respects every page, and even many sentences, will have to be worked out by the reader. This has been aimed at intentionally because only in this way can the book become to the reader what it ought to be. The one who merely reads it through will not have read it at all. Its truths must be experienced, lived. Only in this sense has spiritual science any value.
The book cannot be judged from the standpoint of science if the point of view adopted in forming such a judgment is not gained from the book itself. If the critic will adopt this point of view, he will certainly see that the presentation of the facts given in this book will in no way conflict with truly scientific methods. The author is satisfied that he has taken care not to come into conflict with his own scientific scrupulousness even by a single word.
Those who feel more drawn to another method of searching after the truths here set forth will find such a method in my Philosophy of Freedom. The lines of thought taken in these two books, though different, lead to the same goal. For the understanding of the one, the other is by no means necessary, although undoubtedly helpful to some persons.
Those who look for “ultimate” truths in this book will perhaps lay it aside unsatisfied. The primary intention of the author has been to present the fundamental truths underlying the whole domain of spiritual science. It lies in the very nature of man to ask at once about the beginning and the end of the world, the purpose of existence, and the nature and being of God. Anyone, however, who looks not for mere phrases and concepts of the intellect, but for a real understanding of life, knows that in a work that deals with the elements of spiritual knowledge, things may not be said that belong to the higher stages of wisdom. It is indeed only through an understanding of these elements that it becomes clear how higher questions should be asked. In another work forming a continuation of this one, namely in the author's Occult Science, an Outline, further particulars will be found on the subject here dealt with.
In the preface to a second edition of this book the following supplementary remarks were inserted: Anyone who at the present time gives a description of supersensible facts ought to be quite clear on two points. The first is that the cultivation of supersensible knowledge is a necessity for our age; the other is that the intellectual and spiritual life of the day is full of ideas and feelings that make a description like this appear to many as an absolute chaos of fantastic notions and dreams. Knowledge of the supersensible is a necessity today because all that a man can learn through current methods about the world and life arouses in him numerous questions. Those can be answered only by means of supersensible truths. We ought not to deceive ourselves with regard to the fact that the teaching concerning the fundamental truths of existence given within the intellectual and spiritual currents of today is for the deeply feeling soul a source, not of answer, but of questions about the great problems of the universe and of life. Some people may for a time hold firmly to the opinion that they can find a solution of the problems of existence within conclusions from strictly scientific facts, and within the deductions of this or that thinker of the day. But when the soul descends into those depths into which it must descend if it is to understand itself, what at first seemed to be an answer appears only as the incentive to the real question. An answer to this question does not merely have to satisfy human curiosity. On it depend the inner calm and completeness of the soul life. The attainment of such an answer does not satisfy merely the thirst for knowledge. It makes a man capable of practical work and fits him for the duties of life, while the lack of an answer to these questions lames his soul and finally his body also. In fact, the knowledge of the supersensible is not merely something that meets a theoretical requirement. It supplies a method for leading a truly practical life. It is just because of the nature of our present day intellectual life that study in the domain of spiritual knowledge is indispensable.
On the other hand it is an evident fact that many today reject most strongly what they most sorely need. Some people are so greatly influenced by theories built up on the basis of exact scientific experience that they cannot do otherwise than regard the contents of a book like this as a boundless absurdity. The exponent of supersensible truths is able to view such a fact entirely free from any illusions. People will certainly be prone to demand that he give irrefutable proofs for what he states, but they do not realize that in so doing they are the victims of a misconception. They demand, although unconsciously, not the proofs lying within the things themselves, but those that they personally are willing to recognize or are in a condition to recognize. The author of this book is sure that any person, taking his stand on the basis of the science of the present day, will find that it contains nothing that he will be unable to accept. He knows that all the requirements of modern science can be complied with, and for this very reason the method adopted here of presenting the facts of the supersensible world supplies its own justification. In fact, the way in which true modern science approaches and deals with a subject is precisely the one that is in full harmony with this presentation. Anyone who thinks thus will feel moved by many a discussion in a way described by Goethe's deeply true saying, “A false teaching does not offer any opening to refutation because it rests upon the conviction that the false is true.” Argument is fruitless with those who allow only such proofs to weigh with them as fit in with their own way of thinking. Those who know the true nature of what is called “proving” a matter see clearly that the human soul finds truth through other means than by argument. It is with these thoughts in mind that the author offers this book for publication.
Preface to the Revised English Edition
This book has been carefully and thoroughly revised by me for each new edition. The substance of the first edition remains, it is true, unaltered, but in certain parts I have sought to bring the mode of expression more into accord with the content of spiritual vision. I have especially endeavored to do this in the chapter on Re-Embodiment of the Spirit and Destiny (Karma).
Descriptions of the supersensible must be treated differently from descriptions of the sensible world. They appeal to the reader in a different way. They demand more from him and he must work with the author more intensely in thought while reading. The author needs his co-operation to a far higher degree than does one who writes descriptions drawn from the regions of the sensory world. Many critics will perhaps complain because I have made special efforts to comply with this demand in my description of the spiritual world. The spiritual world, however, has not the definite outlines of the physical, and if anyone were to represent it so as to give the impression that this was the case, he would be describing something untrue. In describing the spiritual world of facts, the style must be in accordance with the mobile, flowing character of that world.
Inner truth for descriptions of the spiritual world belongs alone to what is expressed in flowing, mobile ideas. The peculiar character of the spiritual world must be carried over into the ideas. If the reader applied the standard to which he is accustomed from descriptions of the sensory world, he will find it difficult to adapt himself to this different method of description.
It is by inner exertion of the soul that the human being is able to reach the supersensible world. That world would, indeed, have no value if it lay spread out wholly before this consciousness. It would then be in no way different from the sensuous world. Before it can be known, the longing must be present to find what lies more deeply hidden in existence than do the forces of the world perceived by the senses. This longing is one of the inner experiences that prepare the way for a knowledge of the supersensible world. Even as there can be no blossom without first the root, so supersensible knowledge has no true life without this longing.
It would, however, be a mistake to suppose that the ideas of the supersensible world arise as an illusion of this longing. The lungs do not create the air for which they long, neither does the human soul create out of its longing the ideas of the supersensible world. The soul has this longing because it is formed and built for the supersensible world, just as the lungs are constructed for air.
There may be those who say that this supersensible world can only have significance for such as already have the power to perceive it, but this is not so. There is no need to be a painter in order to feel the beauty of a painting, yet only a painter can paint it. In the same sense it is unnecessary to be a researcher in the supersensible in order to judge the truth of the results of supersensible research. It is only necessary to be a researcher in order to discover them. This is right in principle. In the last chapter of this book, however — and in detail in others of my books — the methods are given whereby it is possible for anyone to become a researcher in the supersensible world, and thus be in a position to test the results of such research. - Rudolf Steiner, April, 1922
Introduction
When in the autumn of 1813, Johann Gottlieb Fichte gave to the world as the ripe fruit of a life wholly devoted to the service of truth, his Introduction to the Science of Knowledge, he said at the very outset, “This doctrine presupposes an entirely new inner sense organ or instrument through which a new world is revealed having no existence for the ordinary man.” He then showed by a simile how incomprehensible this doctrine must be when judged by conception of the ordinary senses. “Think of a world of people born blind who, therefore, know only those objects and relations that exist through the sense of touch. Go among them, and speak to them of colors and the other relations that exist only through light and for the sense of sight. You will convey nothing to their minds, and this will be the more fortunate if they tell you so, for you will then quickly notice your mistake and, if unable to open their eyes, you will cease talking in vain . . . .”
Now those who speak about such things as Fichte does in this instance, often find themselves in the position of a normal man among those born blind. Yet these are things that relate to a man's true being and highest goal, and to believe it necessary “to cease talking in vain” would be to despair of humanity. We ought not to doubt for one moment the possibility of opening the eyes of every earnest person to these things. On this supposition all those have written and spoken who have felt within themselves that the inner sense-instrument had developed, thereby enabling them to know the true nature and being of man, which is generally hidden from the outer senses. Hence from the most ancient times such a hidden wisdom has been spoken of again and again. Those who have grasped some understanding of it feel just as sure of their possession as people with normal eyes feel sure of their ability to visualize color. For them this hidden wisdom requires no proof. They know also that this hidden wisdom requires no proof for anyone else to whom the “higher sense” has unfolded itself. They can speak to such a person as a traveler can speak about America to people who have themselves never seen that country but who can visualize it, for they would see all that he has seen were the opportunity to present itself to them.
It is not, however, only to researchers into the spiritual world that the observer of the supersensible has to speak. He must address his words to all men, because he has to give an account of things that concern all men. Indeed, he knows that without a knowledge of these things no one can, in the true sense of the word, be a human being. Thus, he speaks to all men because he knows there are different degrees of understanding for what he has to say. The feeling for truth and the power of understanding it are inherent in everyone, and he knows that even those who are still far from the moment in which they will acquire the ability to make their own spiritual research can bring a measure of understanding to meet him. He addresses himself first to this understanding that can flash forth in every healthy soul. He knows that in this understanding there is a force that must slowly lead to the higher degrees of knowledge. This feeling, which perhaps at first perceives nothing at all of what it is told, is itself the magician that opens the “eye of the spirit.” In darkness this feeling stirs. The soul sees nothing, but through this feeling it is seized by the power of truth. The truth then gradually draws nearer to the soul and opens the higher sense in it. In one person it may take a longer, in another a shorter time. Everyone, however, who has patience and endurance reaches this goal, for although not every physical eye can be operated on, every spiritual eye can be opened. When it will be opened is only a question of time.
Erudition and scientific training are not prerequisite conditions for the unfolding of this higher sense. It can develop in the unsophisticated person just as in the renowned scientist. Indeed, what is often called at the present time the only true science can, for the attainment of this goal, be frequently a hindrance rather than a help because this science considers real only what is accessible to the ordinary senses. Its merits in regard to the knowledge of that reality may be ever so great, yet when science declares that what is necessary and a blessing for itself shall also be authoritative for all human knowledge, it thereby creates a mass of prejudices that close the approach to higher realities.
The objection is often made to what has just been said that insurmountable limits have been once and forever set to man's knowledge, and since a man cannot overstep these limits, all knowledge must be rejected that does not take them into account. Furthermore, the one who presumes to make assertions about things, which for many stand proved as lying beyond the limits of man's capacity for knowledge, is looked upon as being highly immodest. In making such objections the fact is entirely disregarded that a development of the human powers of knowledge must precede the higher knowledge. What lies beyond the limits of knowledge before such a development takes place is, after the awakening of faculties slumbering in every man, entirely within the realm of knowledge.
One point in this connection must not be neglected. It might be said, “Of what use is it to speak to people about things for which their powers of knowledge are not yet awakened and are therefore still closed to them?” This is really the wrong way to view the matter. Certain powers are required to discover the things referred to, but if after having been discovered they are made known, every person can understand them who is willing to bring to them unprejudiced logic and a healthy sense of truth. In this book the things made known are wholly of a kind that must produce the impression that through them the riddles of human life and the phenomena of the world can be satisfactorily approached. This impression will be produced upon everyone who permits thought, unclouded by prejudice, and a feeling for truth, free and without reservation, to work within him. Put yourself for a moment in the position of asking, “If the things asserted here are true, do they afford a satisfying explanation of life?” You will find that the life of every man supplied a confirmation.
In order to be a teacher in these higher regions of existence it is by no means sufficient to have simply developed the sense for them. To that end science is just as necessary as it is for the teacher's calling in the world of ordinary reality. Higher seeing alone does not make a knower in the spiritual any more than healthy sense organs make a scholar in the ream of sensible realities. Because in truth all reality, the lower as well as the higher spiritual, are only two sides of one and the same fundamental being, anyone who is ignorant in the lower branches of knowledge will as a rule remain ignorant in the higher. This fact creates a feeling of immeasurable responsibility in the person who, through a spiritual call, feels himself summoned to speak about the spiritual regions of existence. It imposes upon him humility and reserve. This should deter no one — not even those whose other circumstances of life afford them no opportunity for the study of ordinary science — from occupying himself with the higher truths. Everyone can fulfill his task as a man without understanding anything of botany, zoology, mathematics and the other sciences. He cannot, however, in the full sense of the word, be a human being without having come in some way or other nearer to an understanding of the nature and destination of man as revealed through the knowledge of the supersensible.
The highest to which a man is able to look, he calls the Divine, and he somehow must think of the highest destiny as being in connection with this Divinity. The wisdom, therefore, that reaches out beyond the sensible and reveals to him his own being and with it his final goal, may well be called divine wisdom or theosophy. To the study of the spiritual process in human life and in the cosmos, the term spiritual science may be given. When, as in this book, one extracts from this spiritual science those special results that have reference to the spiritual core of man's being then the expression theosophy may be employed to designate this domain because it has been employed for centuries in this way.
From this point of view there will be sketched in this book an outline of the theosophical conception of the universe. The writer of it will bring forward nothing that is not a fact for him in the same sense that an experience of the outer world is a fact for eyes and ears and the ordinary intelligence. The concern here is with experiences that become accessible to everyone who is determined to tread the path of knowledge described in a later chapter of this book. We take the right attitude towards the things of the supersensible world when we assume that sound thinking and feeling are capable of understanding everything of true knowledge that emerges from the higher worlds. Further, when we start from this understanding and therewith lay down a firm foundation, we have also made a great step forward towards, “seeing” for ourselves, even though in order to attain this, other things must be added also. We lock and bolt the door to the true higher knowledge, however, when we despise this road and are determined to penetrate the higher worlds only in some other way. To have decided to recognize higher worlds only when we have seen them is a hindrance in the way of this very seeing itself. The determination to understand first through sound thinking what later can be seen, furthers that seeing. It conjures forth important powers of the soul that lead to this seeing of the seer.