Steiner Online Library Spiritual Science for Human Evolution

Deeper Secrets of Human History
in the Light of the Gospel of St. Matthew
GA 117

Synopsis

Lecture I. 2 November, 1909

Christ-Jesus: the Being of Light and Love. The Gospel of St. John: transcendental Ideas. The Gospel of St. Luke: self-offering sacrifice. The Gospel of St. Mark: the spirit-power of the earthly sun-hidden forces of nature and of spirit. The Gospel of St. Matthew: the. Christ as the harmonised picture of Man: secrets of human history

Lecture II. 9 November, 1909

The faculty of reasoned thought, recognising Divinity without clairvoyance, as an external revelation, is developed in the ancient Hebrew people. To this end, the particular bodily constitution of Abraham must be transmitted by way of heredity. The combining of the mathematical world-picture with inner Imagination is achieved through Moses in Egypt. The Law is given in Arabia. In the Babylonian captivity, contact is made with oriental wisdom. Recapitulation of the history of the ancient Hebrew people in the coming of Jesus of Bethlehem. The kingdom of Man or the kingdom of Heaven.

Lecture III. 23 November, 1909

The different streams of spiritual life in antiquity converge in Jesus. Ancient clairvoyance and the significance of blood-relationship fade away before the new happening: the full function of the Ego, the kingdom of Heaven. Preparation for this among the Nazarenes. The Baptism of John. The Children of the Serpent and the image of the Lamb. John the Baptist as the bringer-in of the new era, in which the spiritual world shines into the soul of man through the phenomena and manifestations of the outer world.

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Quotes

"You can see from this, my dear friends, what mischief will be set on foot if the truths of Spiritual Science are withheld. For man will be exposed to the forces of evil, and he will only be protected from it by giving himself up to the spiritual life of the good. To withhold the spiritual life of goodness from men is to be no friend to humanity. Whoever does this, be he Freemason or Jesuit, is no friend to humanity. For it means handing men over to the forces of evil. And there may be a purpose in doing so. This purpose may be to confine goodness to a small circle, in order by the help of this goodness to dominate the helpless humanity who are thus led by evil into the follies of life."

—Rudolf Steiner,
Spiritual Science Notes On Goethe's Faust, Vol. II, No. 273-8.

Spiritual Exercises

Calendar of the Soul

In 1912 Rudolf Steiner offered a “calendar of the soul” with weekly verses that express how the changing seasons in both the outer natural world and our inner lives help humanity evolve. Download and read the verses in four translations with commentary by Eloise Krivosheia of the Los Angeles Branch of the Anthroposophical Society.

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2022-2023 Calendar Dates