Anthroposophy will have an immense significance for human thought and feeling, and for man’s will and actions

Anthroposophy must become a new impulse of culture in an encompassing way. For a long time humanity has been yearning for it, and from many aspects it is called upon to give an answer to the burning questions now advanced by men. At the present time, however, anthroposophy is to a great extent something which people not only wish to oppose, but something which they look upon as questionable, even as mad, like the dreams of certain fantastic brains.

Of course, if they were to ask these dreamers what THEY seek through anthroposophy and what they expect from it, their answer will be a rather wide one. Those who have recognised the vital essence of anthroposophy, which modern people take to be mere dreams, look upon anthroposophy as something which in a few decades will have an immense significance for human thought and feeling, and for man’ s will and actions.

There is nothing into which anthroposophy cannot shed its light as an impulse, nothing into which it is not called upon to shine.

It is a well known fact that at the present time there are many problems, hygienic, social or pedagogical problems, or women’s suffrage, and even greater is the number of answers supplied to these questions. But if we investigate all these questions and answers in an objective way, we come to the conclusion that modern civilisation puts the questions rightly—for they are determined by the conditions of our time—but that our modern epoch is not able to supply the answers to these questions without further ado. One who shuts his eyes and ears to the problems of our time, will continually encounter obstacles along his path. A time will come when men will realize that they must face many other problems too: these problems arise out of the inner, and outer strife of humanity, out of all the pains and sufferings and out of the shattered hopes in every field. But only anthroposophy is able to supply an answer.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 100 – Theosophie and Rosicrucianism – Kassel, 16 June 1907

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA100/English/ANS1942/19070616p01.html

Frogman – Art of Carol Herzer

Matter is condensed spirit

Every form of life is spiritual. Even as ice is condensed water, so matter is condensed spirit. Mineral, plant, animal, or man—each is a condensed form of the spirit.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 100 – Theosophie and Rosicrucianism – Kassel, 16 June 1907

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA100/English/ANS1942/19070616p01.html

During past lives our souls have frequently heard the deep truths which will be explained in today’s lecture

If we immerse ourselves in the development of human souls, we shall find in the course of these lectures, that human souls have already lived many times upon the physical plane, and that they gradually developed, until they reached the present stage, At first, this may sound strange, yet during past lives our souls have frequently heard the deep truths which will be explained in today’s lecture.

The teaching of reincarnation will, for instance, be advanced; but your souls have listened, as they are listening to me now, to the Druids who lived and taught particularly in this region (Kassel-Germany). These druidic teachers of ancient times (The earliest sources that speak of Druids date from the 3rd century BC. – Wikipedia) already taught the truth of reincarnation to a smaller circle; they cultivated this primordial wisdom concerning the riddles of life. They went out to those whose souls thirsted for a deeper knowledge. But if these teachers of ancient times had spoken as I am speaking to you now, your souls could not then have understood them, for at that time the human spirit had not yet reached the present stage of development. Logical thought did not as yet exist in the human spirit. Man possessed instead the possibility of grasping truths in the form of images. These teachers therefore spoke in the form of images, and these images are known to us to-day in the form of legends and myths. If in the past our souls had not heard these teachings, we could not understand the spiritual truths to-day, when they are taught to us in a new form.

The soul thus makes enormous progresses through thousands of years; it continually takes on a new shape and therefore truth must be presented in a constantly new form; it must ever again be proclaimed anew.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 100 – Theosophie and Rosicrucianism – Kassel, 16 June 1907

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA100/English/ANS1942/19070616p01.html

Kassel – Germany

Purification of thinking, feeling and willing

We must develop our intelligence. Some people have the intelligence of an eight year old who can only do their jobs if everything is dictated from above. Otherwise they collapse. 

Another danger is that if an esoteric has had some special experiences he may think that he’s very devoted and selfless, when in fact there’s a fine egotism behind this that’s hard to detect. This also has to go if one really wants the Christ to be born in one. And one can only overcome it through pure thinking. If one has seen something astral or the like, one should be clear about what it is, and not imagine that it’s of great importance or that it proves that one is already far advanced. One should confront everything clearly and impersonally and purify one’s thinking, feeling and willing in order to let the spirit work through one.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 266-1 – Esoteric Lessons/Number 48 – Berlin, 21 March 1909

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA266/English/UNK1998/19090321e01.html

Art of Carol Herzer

For the ancient Egyptian astronomer was everything the expression of something spiritual

Today, when a materialistic astronomer contemplates the heavenly bodies, he only sees in them physical bodies, and nothing besides. Even the earth is to him a physical body in the world’s spaces, and man crawls about upon it, like the gnat upon our hand.

But it was otherwise among the ancient Egyptian astronomers. When the ancient Egyptian astrologer looked upon a star, he did not think of a purely physical body, for the star meant to him something quite different than it does to modern men. When he pronounced, for instance, the name of Mercury, he uttered it with veneration. [….]

Everything which the eye perceived was at that time the expression of something spiritual. For the ancient astronomer, the physical star Mercury was therefore the expression of the Spirit of Mercury. You must not grasp this intellectually, but with your feeling, for otherwise you cannot understand what lived in the soul of such an astronomer. Everything in the world was to him the expression of something spiritual. He said: Everything is Spirit, and I, as a spirit, am a part of this Spirit.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 100 – Theosophie and Rosicrucianism – Kassel, 16 June 1907

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA100/English/ANS1942/19070616p01.html

Planet Mercury