Festivals of the Seasons
GA 127
21 December 1911, Berlin
8. Christmas: A Festival of Inspiration
From within our work in the Anthroposophical movement we look forward into the future of humanity and we let our souls and hearts be permeated with that which we believe will embody itself in the streams of evolution and in the forces of evolution of the future of humanity. When we contemplate the great truths of existence, when we look up to the Forces, Powers and Beings who reveal themselves to us in the spiritual worlds as the cause and foundation of all that meets us in the sense-world, here also we rejoice to know that the truths which we bring down from the spiritual worlds will and must be gradually realised more and more in the souls and hearts of the men of the future. Thus for the greater part of the year our spiritual gaze is directed either to the immediate present or the future.
All the more do we feel ourselves impelled on the special days of the year—on the Festivals which come through to us from time and its changes as set reminders of that which earlier humanity imagined and devised—on these feast days we feel ourselves impelled to realise our union with this earlier humanity, to sink ourselves a little into that which led men of past time out of fulness of heart and soul to place these sign-marks in the course of time which come down to us as the ‘Festivals of the year.’ If the Easter Festival is such as to awaken in us, when we understand it, thoughts of human powers and of the power of overcoming all the lower through the higher, everything externally physical through the spiritual, if the Easter Festival is a festival of resurrection, of awaking, a festival of hope and confidence in the spiritual forces which can be awakened in the human soul; so, on the other hand, the Christmas Festival is a festival of the realisation of harmony with the whole cosmos, a festival of the realisation of Grace. It is a festival that can again and again bring home the thought: No matter how doubtful everything around us may appear, however much the bitterest doubts may enter into faith, however much the worst disappointments may mingle with the most aspiring hopes, however much all that is good around us in life may totter, there is something in human nature and essence—this the rightly understood thought of the Christmas Festival may say—that only needs to be brought vitally, spiritually, before the soul, which reveals to us perpetually that we are descended from the powers of good, from the forces of right, from the forces of the true. The Easter thought points us to our victorious forces in the future—the Christmas thought points us, in a certain sense, to the origin of man in the primeval past.
In such a case one can clearly see, how the unconscious or subconscious reason or spirituality of man stands far, far higher than man with his consciousness can wholly compass. We have often reason to admire that which men have established in the past out of the hidden depths of the soul more than that which they have established out of their intellectual thoughts and understanding. How infinitely wise it appears to us, when we open the calendar, and for the 25th December we find registered the Birth-Festival of Christ Jesus, and then we see registered in the calender for the 24th December ‘Adam and Eve.’ It may be said: How clearly reasonable and spiritual it appears that out of the dim subconscious work of the Middle Ages, when Christmas plays were performed here or there about Christmas time by people from different places, when the ‘singers’ as they were called gathered for their Christmas plays, that the Paradise Tree should be brought forward. As in the calender ‘Adam and Eve’ appeared before the Christ Birthday Festival, so in the Christmas plays of the Middle Ages, the Tree of Paradise was brought forward by the troupe which took part in the performance of the Christmas plays. In short, there was something in the deep hidden soul-depths of men which caused them to place directly together the earthly beginning of humanity and the Jesus Birth Festival. In the year 353, even in ecclesiastical Rome, the 25th December was not kept as the Festival of the Birthday of Jesus. Only in 354 the Jesus Birthday Festival was celebrated for the first time in ecclesiastical Rome. Previous to this, there was a festival which brought to men a consciousness similar to the Jesus Birth Festival, namely, the 6th January, the day of remembrance of the Baptism by John in Jordan, the day which was commemorative of the Descent of the Christ from the spiritual heights, and the Self-immersion of the Christ into the body of Jesus of Nazareth. That was originally the Birth of the Christ in Jesus, the remembrance of the great historical moment which is symbolically presented to us as the hovering dove over the head of Jesus of Nazareth. The 6th January was the commemorative day of the birth of the Christ in Jesus of Nazareth. In the fourth century, however, it had for a long time been impossible for the self-assertive materialistic philosophy of the West to understand the penetration of Jesus with the Christ. Like a powerful fight this thought with instantaneous illumination was present to the Gnostics, who were in a certain respect contemporaries or direct followers of the Event of Golgotha. They were in the position of finding it unnecessary to seek the depth of this wisdom of the ‘Christ’ in ‘Jesus’ as we have to seek this wisdom again through modern clairvoyance. The Gnostics were able, by means of the last flickering of those old, original human clairvoyant powers to see, as it were, in the light of grace that which we must acquire again for ourselves concerning the great secrets of Golgotha. Much was clear to the Gnostics which we have to acquire again, for example, in particular, the secret of the birth of Christ in Jesus at the Baptism by John in Jordan.
Just as the old clairvoyance faded away for humanity generally, so did also the peculiar kindling of the highest clairvoyant power, of the highest Christmas light of humanity, which the Gnostics possessed. In the fourth century Western Christianity was no longer able to understand this great thought. Hence in the fourth century the true meaning of the Festival of the appearing of the Christ in Jesus was lost to Western civilisation. Man had forgotten what this ‘Festival of the Appearing’ of the 6th January actually meant. They had for a time—yes, right into our time, buried under much materialistic intellectual rubbish what indeed would not allow itself to be destroyed, the feeling toward the Christ-Figure in human evolution. If man could not understand that One Most High, as compared with humanity, had manifested Himself in the Baptism by John in Jordan, yet he could understand,—for that did not contradict materialistic knowledge,—that that bodily organism which was selected for the reception of the Christ was something significant. Hence they put back the Spirit-birth, which indeed took place in the John-Baptism in Jordan, to the Child-birth of Jesus of Nazareth, and set the ‘Jesus-Birth-Festival’ in place of the ‘Festival of the Appearing.’ To represent quite rightly and in detail, that which became the Christmas Festival of humanity always aroused significant feelings, high exalted feelings. Something significant lived in the human soul at the approach of Christmas, which may be expressed as follows: If man contemplates the world in the right sense, he can, by belief in humanity, fortify himself against certain things, against all life’s dangers and blows of fate; in the feeling of love and peace man can fortify himself in his deepest soul against all disharmony and strife of life. This is something which becomes ever more clearly bound up with the Christmas Festival. For what was it actually of which man reminded himself? From our anthroposophical point of view let us look at what man remembered.
We know what significant, real and powerful preparations human evolution had to go through in order that the Mystery of Golgotha could enter this human evolution. The human being who was the reincarnated Zarathustra, had to be born as one of the two Jesus children. He also had to be born for whom the real Jesus-Birth-Festival was the commemorative festival; he had to be born whose soul-substance had remained in the spiritual worlds. So long as humanity went through all that was possible within heredity through the generations up to the Mystery of Golgotha—for all other human souls had gone through the generations—so long had man been taking up the destroying forces that crept right into the blood. One single soul substance had remained behind in the spiritual worlds, guarded by the purest Mysteries and Mystery-centres, and then it was poured out into humanity as the soul of the second Jesus-child, the child of the Luke Gospel, that Jesus-child to whose birth all the commemorations and representations of the Christ-Festival, of Christmas, belong. At Christmas-time men’s thoughts went back to the origin of humanity, to the human soul, which had not yet descended, not even into Adam’s nature. They would say: In Bethlehem, in Palestine was born that soul-substance which had not taken part in the descent of humanity, but had remained behind, and for the first time in fact entered into a human body, in incarnating in the Jesus described by Luke. The human soul, when its thought is directed to the fact, may feel: One can believe in humanity, one can have faith in humanity; however much conflict, however much disbelief, however much disharmony has entered into it—and they have entered into all that has flowed into humanity from the time of Adam to the present—when one looks back on that which in olden times was called ‘Adam Kadmon,’ which became later the ‘Christ’ conception, there was kindled in the human soul confidence in the soundness of human force, and there was kindled confidence in the primeval peace-and-love nature of humanity. Hence the subconscious soul of man drew together the Jesus-birth Festival and the Adam and Eve Festival because man saw in fact his own nature in the Christ Child that was born, but his own nature in its innocence, in its purity.
Why then was the Divine Child placed before humanity for hundreds and thousands of years as the highest there was for the human soul to revere? For the reason that when man looks at a child and sees the child not yet able to say ‘I’ to himself, he can know that the child is still working on the human body, the Temple of the Eternally Divine, and because the human child who cannot yet say ‘I’ nevertheless clearly shows the sign of his origin from the spiritual world. Through this contemplation of the child nature man learns to have full trust in human nature. Here, where he can most easily foregather, when the sun shines least and warms the earth least, when he is not busied with the ordering of his outer affairs, here, when the days are shortest and the nights longest, when the earth gives him the best opportunity to foregather and to enter into himself, when all outer brightness, all outer beauty withdraws for a while from the outward view—here, the Western civilisation places the Birth-Festival of the Divine Child, that is, of the Human Being who enters the world pure and unsullied—and through the innocent entrance into the world can give to man at the time of his closest assembling with others, the strongest, the highest confidence through the knowledge of his divine origin.
To the anthroposophist it is a confirmation of the great truth that one can learn most from the child, when one sees that a festival of a child’s birth is placed in the course of time as a great significant festival of confidence in human evolution. So we admire the subconscious, the spiritual reason of the men of the past, who have placed such sign posts in the path of time. We feel then like those who decipher wonderful hieroglyphs, produced by the men of old through the placing of such festivals in the writing of the times and we feel one with these men of old. Whilst at other times our look is directed towards the future, whilst at other times we are willing to place our best powers at the disposal of the future, to strengthen and increase all faith in the future, here, on such festival days, we seek just to live in remembrance, to draw towards us as though incarnated the old thoughts teaching us at the present time that we can think truly in our way of what lies in the spiritual at the foundation of the external world; but that in earlier times—in a different way, it is true, but not less right, not less magnificent and significant—the True and Sublime was thought and experienced through the realisation of the oneness of humanity and the high possibilities that then lay ahead of humanity. This is our anthroposophical ideal, to be able to feel one with that which the men of old produced—often from the most hidden depths of the soul. These festivals, particularly the great ones, encourage this, if we can only through the anthroposophical truths imprint in our souls the significance of the hieroglyphic signs written in the path of time.
A wonderful thought unites with a wonderful emotion in our souls when we see how, in those centuries which followed the fourth which first transferred the Jesus-Birth Festival to the 25th of December, how there here flows into the souls of those men the feeling of confidence awakened through the child-nature, so that in painting, in the Christmas plays, everywhere, is shown how all the creatures of the Earth-kingdom bow before the Jesus-Child, before the Divine Child, before the divine origin of man. There comes before us the wonderful picture of the manger, how the beasts bow before this primal man; to these may be added those wonderful stories, as for instance that when Mary had taken the Child Jesus on the way to Egypt, a tree bowed itself, a very ancient tree, as the border was crossed by Mary with the child. Traditionally the legends of almost the whole of Europe relate that the trees in a remarkable way, in the Holy Night, bow to this great event. We could go to Alsace, to Bavaria, everywhere we find legends, how certain trees bear fruit in the Holy Night. All wonderful symbols which proclaim in fact how the birth of the Jesus-Child reveals itself as something which is connected with the whole life of the earth. When we recollect what we have so often said—that the ancient spiritual streams were given by the Gods to mankind, and how in ancient times men had clairvoyant insight into the divine spiritual world, how this clairvoyance gradually vanished from humanity in order that men might be able to come to the gaining of the ego—if we picture how here, in the whole human organisation something like a drying-up, a withering, of the old divine forces is taking place, and how through the Christ-Impulse which came through the Mystery of Golgotha there is a flooding of the withering divine forces with new water of life; then there appears to us in a wonderful picture what the Christmas legends relate to us, how the dried up and withered roses of Jericho shoot up of themselves in the Holy Night. That is a legend which we find everywhere noted down in the Middle Ages, that the roses of Jericho blossom in the Christ-night and unfold, because they first unfolded under the footsteps of Mary, who, when she carried the Child Jesus on the journey to Egypt, stepped over a place where a rose tree was growing. A wonderful symbol of what happened to human divine powers, that even things so dry and lifeless as that which one usually finds on the wayside, as the roses which apparently are dead, can spring up again and shoot forth through the Christ-Impulse which entered into the time evolution.
That to man was first given in reality what was destined from the beginning is expressed in the Jesus-Birth Festival, in the festival of the Birth of the Jesus infant. Before Adam and Eve existed, that was destined for humanity—so the Christmas legend says—which yet lies in the quite unspoilt divine child-nature of man. In truth however—and really on account of the influence of Lucifer—man has only been able to attain it after the whole period of time from Adam and Eve to the Mystery of Golgotha.
A deep emotion awakens in our souls when we take for our meditation a feeling, compressed into the one night of the 24th and 25th December, of what mankind has become from Adam and Eve to the birth of Christ in Jesus, through the Luciferic powers. If we can realise that, we shall really grasp the significance of this Festival, and realise the goal before humanity. It is as though humanity, if it would use its opportunity and take these sign posts of time as material for meditation, could really become aware of its pure origin in the cosmic forces of the universe. Here, looking up into the cosmic forces of the universe and penetrating a little by means of Anthroposophy, through the true spiritual wisdom into the secrets of the universe, humanity can first become ripe to understand this, that what as the Christ-Birth Festival was once understood by the Gnostics, was in fact the festival celebrated on January 6th, the Festival of the Birth of Christ in the body of Jesus of Nazareth, as a higher stage of the Birth-Festival of Jesus. To enable us to plunge into the twelve great Forces of the universe, the twelve Holy Nights are set between the Christmas Festival and the festival which should be celebrated on the sixth of January, which now is the festival of the Three Holy Kings, and which in fact is the festival we have been speaking about.
Again, without man’s really knowing it in present knowledge, these twelve Holy Nights are established out of the hidden wise depths of the soul of mankind, as though they would say: ‘Realise the depths of the Christmas Festival, but sink during the twelve Holy Nights into the holiest secrets of the cosmos, that is, in the realms of the universe out of which Christ descended to the Earth.’ Only when mankind wills to be inspired through the thought of the holy childlike divine origin of man, to let himself be inspired by the wisdom that works through the twelve forces, through the twelve holy forces of the universe, symbolically presented in the twelve signs of the Zodiac, due in truth to spiritual wisdom—only when mankind sinks into true spiritual wisdom and learns to discern the course of time in the great cosmos and in the single human being, only then will the mankind of the future, fructified through Spiritual Science, find to its own salvation the inspiration which can come from the Jesus-Birth Festival so that thoughts for the future may be permeated with fullest confidence and richest hopes.
Thus we may as anthroposophists allow the Christmas Festival to work on our souls as an inspiration festival, as a festival that brings the thought of human origin in the holy divine primeval human child so wonderfully before our souls. That light which appears to us in the Holy Night as the symbol of the Light of humanity at its source, that Light which is symbolically presented to us later in the lights of the Christmas-tree, rightly understood, is the Light that can give to our striving souls the best and strongest forces for our true real world-peace, for the true blessedness and real hope for the world.
Let us feel ourselves strengthened for the needs of the-future by such thoughts on the facts of the past, on the establishing of the festivals in the past; Christmas thoughts, remembrance thoughts on the origin of humanity, thoughts well-rooted which will unfold themselves to real, to most mighty soul-plants for the true future of humanity.
Weihnachten - Ein Inspirationsfest
Innerhalb unseres Arbeitens in der geisteswissenschaftlichen Bewegung blicken wir vorwärts, vorwärts in die Zukunft der Menschheit, und durchdringen unsere Seelen und unsere Herzen mit demjenigen, wovon wir glauben, daß es sich einverleiben soll in die Entwickelungsströmungen und in die Entwickelungskräfte der Menschenzukunft. Und auch wenn wir zu den großen Wahrheiten des Daseins aufblicken, aufblicken zu den Kräften, Mächten und Wesen, welche sich uns in der spirituellen Welt als die Ursachen und Urgründe dessen offenbaren, was uns in der äußeren Sinneswelt entgegentritt, auch da sind wir beseelt davon, daß die Wahrheiten, die wir also aus den geistigen Welten herunterholen, allmählich sich einleben sollen und einleben müssen in die Seelen, in die Herzen der Menschen der Zukunft.
So ist denn im größten Teil des Jahres unser geistiger Blick entweder der unmittelbaren Gegenwart oder aber der Zukunft zugewendet. Um so mehr fühlen wir uns gedrungen, an den Merktagen des Jahres, an den Festen, welche wie fixierte Erinnerungen an das, was die Vormenschheit erdacht und ersonnen hat, aus der Zeit und ihrem Wandel zu uns hereinragen, unsere Verbindung mit dieser Vormenschheit zu empfinden, ein wenig uns zu versenken in dasjenige, was aus den Seelen, aus den Herzen der Menschen der Vergangenheit dazu geführt hat, jene Merkzeichen in den Lauf der Zeiten hineinzustellen, welche uns als die Feste des Jahres erscheinen.
Ist das Osterfest ein solches, das, wenn wir es verstehen, in uns Gedanken wachruft an menschliche Kräfte und an Überwindungsfähigkeit alles Niederen durch das Höhere, alles äußerlich Physischen durch das Geistige, ist es ein Fest der Auferstehung, der Erweckung, ein Fest der Hoffnung und der Zuversicht an die geistigen Kräfte, die in der Menschenseele erweckt werden können, so ist auf der anderen Seite das Weihnachtsfest ein Fest der Harmonieempfindung mit dem ganzen Kosmos, ein Fest der Gnadenempfindung, ein Fest, das uns immer wieder und wieder den Gedanken nahebringen kann: Wie sich auch alles um uns herum erweisen mag, wie auch in den Glauben sich die herbsten Zweifel hineinmischen können, wie sich auch in die kühnsten Hoffnungen die schlimmsten Enttäuschungen hineinmischen können, wie auch um uns herum alle guten Dinge des Lebens wanken können es gibt etwas in der menschlichen Natur und Wesenheit, das kann uns der richtig verstandene Gedanke des Weihnachtsfestes sagen, das nur vor die Seele lebendig, geisthaft hingestellt zu werden braucht, um uns immerwährend zu offenbaren, daß wir von den Kräften des Guten abstammen, von den Kräften des Rechten, von den Kräften des Wahren. — Auf unsere siegenden Kräfte in die Zukunft hin weist uns der Östergedanke. Auf den Menschenursprung in urferner Vergangenheit weist uns in einer gewissen Beziehung demnach der Weihnachtsgedanke.
Bei einer solchen Gelegenheit kann man so recht sehen, wie die unbewußte oder die unterbewußte Vernunft und Geistigkeit der Menschen weit, weit höher steht als das, was der Mensch mit seinem Bewußtsein dann umschließen kann. Wir haben oftmals Grund, dasjenige, was die Menschen aus den verborgenen Seelentiefen in der Vergangenheit festgesetzt haben, viel mehr zu bewundern als das, was sie festsetzten aus ihren verstandesmäßigen Gedanken und aus dem, was sie begrifflich erfassen konnten. Wie unendlich weise erscheint es uns, wenn wir den Kalender aufmachen und für den 25. Dezember verzeichnet finden das Geburtsfest des Christus Jesus und dann im Kalender verzeichnet sehen für den 24.Dezember «Adam und Eva». Man möchte sagen: Anschaulich, vernünftig, geistig konnte einem das vor Augen treten aus dem dumpfen, unterbewußten Schaffen im Mittelalter, wenn da oder dort gegen die Weihnachtszeit die mittelalterlichen Weihnachtsspiele von Leuten dieser oder jener Orte aufgeführt werden sollten. Wenn, wie man sie nannte, die «Singer» zu ihren Weihnachtsspielen zogen, da wurde vorangetragen der «Paradiesbaum». Wie im Kalender «Adam und Eva» vor dem Christ-Geburtstagsfest erschien, so erschien in den mittelalterlichen Weihnachtsspielen der Baum des Paradieses vorangetragen der Truppe, welche zur Aufführung dieser Weihnachtsspiele schritt. Kurz also, es gab einmal etwas, was die tiefen, verborgenen Seelenuntergründe der Menschen veranlaßte, irdischen Menschenanfang und Jesu-Geburtsfest unmittelbar zusammenzustellen. Im Jahre 353 gab es selbst im kirchlichen Rom noch nicht den 25. Dezember als Jesu-Geburtstagsfest. Denn 354 wurde zum ersten Male auch im kirchlichen Rom das Jesu-Geburtstagsfest am 25. Dezember gefeiert. Vorher wurde etwas gefeiert, bei dem man ein ähnliches Bewußtsein hatte wie später an dem Jesu-Geburtstagsfest, nämlich der 6. Januar als der Tag der Erinnerung der Johannestaufe im Jordan, als der Tag, welcher der Gedenktag war des Herunterkommens des Christus aus den spirituellen Höhen und des Sich-Versenkens des Christus in den Leib des Jesus von Nazareth. Das war ursprünglich die Geburt des Christus in dem Jesus, die Erinnerung an den großen geschichtlichen Augenblick, der uns symbolisch dargestellt wird durch das Weilen der Taube über dem Haupt des Jesus von Nazareth. Der 6. Januar war der Erinnerungstag an die Geburt des Christus in dem Jesus von Nazareth.
Aber im 4. Jahrhundert war eigentlich für die sich ankündigende materialistische Weltanschauung des Abendlandes längst die Möglichkeit dahin, den großen Gedanken der Durchdringung des Jesus mit dem Christus zu verstehen. Wie ein gewaltiges Licht war zu kurzer Aufklärung dieser Gedanke vorhanden bei den Gnostikern, die in gewisser Beziehung Zeitgenossen oder unmittelbare Nachfolger des Ereignisses von Golgatha waren und in der Lage waren, daß sie die Tiefe dieser Weisheit von dem «Christus in dem Jesus» nicht in der Weise suchen mußten, wie wir durch das moderne Hellsehen diese Weisheit wieder suchen müssen, sondern bei den Gnostikern war es so, daß sie durch das letzte Aufflackern gerade alter, ursprünglicher menschlicher hellseherischer Kräfte das wie im Gnadenlichte geschaut haben, was wir uns wieder erobern müssen über die großen Geheimnisse von Golgatha. Da leuchtete so manches bei den Gnostikern auf, was wir uns wieder erobern müssen, so zum Beispiel besonders das Geheimnis von dem Geborenwerden des Christus in dem Jesus von Nazareth bei der Johannestaufe im Jordan.
Aber wie das alte Hellsehen überhaupt, so schwand auch für die Menschheit jenes eigentümliche Aufflammen höchster hellseherischer Kräfte, höchsten Weihnachtslichtes der Menschheit dahin, wie es bei den Gnostikern vorhanden war. Und im 4. Jahrhundert war das abendländische Christentum längst nicht mehr imstande, diesen großen Gedanken zu verstehen. Daher hatte im 4. Jahrhundert das eigentliche Erscheinungsfest des Christus in dem Jesus den Sinn für die abendländische christliche Kultur verloren. Man hatte vergessen, was eigentlich dieses Erscheinungsfest, der 6. Januar, bedeutet. Man mußte für eine Zeitlang, ja bis in unsere Gegenwart herein, unter mancherlei materialistischem Verstandesschutt die Empfindung gegenüber der ChristusGestalt in der Menschheitsentwickelung begraben. Und konnte man nicht begreifen, daß ein gegenüber der Menschheit Höchstes sich offenbart hat in der Johannestaufe im Jordan, so konnte man doch, weil das dem materialistischen Bewußtsein nicht widersprach, noch begreifen, daß jene Leibesorganisation, welche dazu ausersehen war, den Christus aufzunehmen, etwas Bedeutsames war. Daher rückte man die Geistgeburt, die eigentlich in der Johannestaufe im Jordan zutage trat, zurück zu der Kindesgeburt des Jesus von Nazareth und setzte das JesuGeburtsfest an die Stelle des Erscheinungsfestes.
Aber wenn man das auch in den wenigsten Fällen klar aussprechen mochte, so lebten doch immer bedeutsame Empfindungen, hohe erhabene Empfindungen in dem, was das Weihnachtsfest der Menschheit wurde. Es lebte etwas Bedeutendes immer in der menschlichen Seele auf, wenn das Weihnachtsfest herannahte. Es lebte das auf, was man nennen möchte: Der Mensch kann, wenn er im richtigen Sinne die Welt beschaut, sich doch gegenüber gewissen Dingen, gegenüber allen Fährlichkeiten und Schicksalsschlägen des Daseins beleben in dem Glauben an die Menschheit, der Mensch kann sich beleben in tiefster Seele an dem Gefühl von Liebe und Frieden gegenüber aller Disharmonie und allem Streit des Lebens.
Das ist etwas, was in Anknüpfung an das Weihnachtsfest, an das JesuGeburtsfest immerdar aufdämmert. Denn was war es denn eigentlich, woran man sich erinnerte? Fassen wir das, woran man sich erinnerte, in geisteswissenschaftlichem Sinne auf. Wir wissen, welche bedeutsamen, großen und gewaltigen Veranstaltungen die Menschheitsentwickelung machen mußte, damit das Mysterium von Golgatha in diese Menschheitsentwickelung hereinbrechen konnte. Da mußte geboren werden ein Mensch, welcher der wiederverkörperte Zarathustra war, der eine der beiden Jesusknaben. Es mußte aber noch derjenige geboren werden, für den das eigentliche Jesu-Geburtsfest das Erinnerungsfest war, es mußte der geboren werden, der seiner Seelensubstanz nach zurückgeblieben war in den geistigen Welten. Solange die Menschheit das alles durchgemacht hat, was sich innerhalb der Vererbung durch die Generationen durchmachen ließ bis zum Mysterium von Golgatha - alle anderen Menschenseelen waren durch die Generationen gegangen -,, so lange hatte man alles das aufgenommen, was sich an zerstörenden Kräften bis in das Blut hineingeschlichen hat. Nur eine einzige Seelensubstanz war in den spirituellen Welten zurückgeblieben, gehütet von den reinsten Mysterien und den reinsten Kultstätten, war dann ausgegossen worden in die Menschheit als Seele des zweiten Jesusknaben, desjenigen, den das Lukas-Evangelium schildert, jenes Jesusknaben, an dessen Geburt namentlich alle Erinnerungen und alle Darstellungen des Christfestes, des Weihnachtsfestes anknüpfen.
Zum Menschenursprung hinauf, zur Menschenseele, als diese noch nicht heruntergestiegen war, selbst noch nicht heruntergestiegen war in Adams Natur, erinnerte sich der Mensch zur Weihnachtszeit. Er wollte sagen, daß in Bethlehem, in Palästina, jene Seelensubstanz geboren wurde, die nicht mit teilgenommen hat an dem Abstieg der Menschheit, sondern zurückgeblieben war und zum ersten Male eigentlich in einen Menschenleib einzog, indem sie in den Lukas-Jesusknaben verkörpert wurde.
Man kann an die Menschheit glauben, man kann zur Menschheit Vertrauen haben, so kann die Menschenseele empfinden, wenn ihr Gedanke sich hinlenken darf zu der Tatsache: Wie auch Streit, wie auch Unglaube, wie auch Disharmonie Platz gegriffen haben innerhalb der Menschheitsentwickelung — und sie haben Platz gegriffen durch alles, was sich in die Menschheit hineinergossen hat von Adams Zeit bis in unsere Gegenwart -, blickt man zurück auf das, was die alten Zeiten «Adam Kadmon» genannt haben, was dann zum Christus-Begriff geworden ist, dann entflammt sich in der Menschenseele Vertrauen zur Richtigkeit der Menschenkraft, entflammt sich das Vertrauen in die ursprüngliche Friedens- und Liebesnatur der Menschheit. Daher rückte das unterbewußte Seelische das Jesu-Geburtsfest unmittelbar zusammen mit dem Adam-und-Eva-Fest, indem der Mensch eigentlich in dem Christkindlein, das geboren wird, seine eigene Natur sieht, aber seine eigene Natur in ihrer Unschuld, in ihrer Unverdorbenheit.
Warum wurde denn das göttliche Kind durch Jahrhunderte, durch Jahrtausende vor die Menschheit hingestellt als das, was es als am höchsten zu Verehrendes für die Menschenseele gibt? Aus dem Grunde, weil der Mensch, hinblickend zu dem Kinde - dann, wenn dieses Kind noch nicht so weit gekommen ist, daß es zu sich «Ich» sagen kann -, schauen kann, wissen kann, daß es noch an dem menschlichen Leib arbeitet, an dem Tempel des ewig Göttlichen, und weil der Mensch, der noch nicht «Ich» sagt, noch deutlich das Zeichen seines Ursprunges aus der spirituellen Welt zeigt. Durch diesen Hinblick auf des Menschen Kindesnatur lernt der Mensch volles Vertrauen haben zur Menschennatur. Da, wo der Mensch sich am meisten sammeln kann, wo die Sonne am wenigsten leuchtet und den Erdball wärmt, wo der Mensch nicht mit der Bestellung der äußeren Angelegenheiten beschäftigt ist, da, wo die Tage am kürzesten, die Nächte am längsten sind, wo alle Gelegenheit auf der Erde so ist, daß sich der Mensch am besten sammeln kann, am besten in sich selber gehen kann, da, wo sich ihm aller äußere Glanz, alle äußere Schönheit für eine Weile dem äußeren Blick entzieht, da stellte die abendländische Kulturentwickelung das Geburtsfest des göttlichen Kindes hin, das heißt des Menschen, der unverdorben die Welt betritt, und durch das unverdorbene Betreten der Welt dem Menschen in der Zeit seiner intensivsten Sammlung das stärkste, das höchste Vertrauen durch das Bewußtsein seines göttlichen Ursprunges geben kann.
Es ist wie eine Bekräftigung der großen Wahrheit, daß man vom Kinde viel lernen kann, wenn man sieht, daß eines Kindes Geburtstagsfest als ein großes, bedeutsames Vertrauensfest für die Menschheitsentwickelung hineingestellt ist in der Zeiten Lauf. Und so bewundern wir die unterbewußte, die spirituelle Vernunft der Menschen der Vorzeit, die solche Marksteine hineingestellt haben in der Zeiten Lauf. Wir fühlen uns dann wie Entzifferer von merkwürdigen Hieroglyphen, die gegeben sind durch das Hineinstellen solcher Feste in die Schrift der Zeiten durch die Menschen der Vorzeit, fühlen uns eins mit diesen Menschen der Vorzeit. Während sonst unser Blick der Zukunft zugewendet ist, während wir sonst willig sind, unsere besten Kräfte der Zukunft zur Verfügung zu stellen, allen Glauben an die Zukunft zu kräftigen und zu stärken, versuchen wir gerade an solchen Festtagen in Erinnerungen zu leben, die alte Gedanken wie verkörpert zu uns herübertragen, die uns lehren, daß wir zwar gegenwärtig nur in unserer Art denken können, was der äußeren Welt im Spirituellen zugrunde liegt, daß aber noch in der Vorzeit - in anderer Art zwar, aber nicht minder richtig, nicht minder grandios und bedeutend — das Wahre, das Erhabene gedacht und empfunden worden ist durch das Sich-Einsfühlen mit der Menschheit, mit allem, was die Menschheit zu ihren Höhen tragen soll. Das ist unser geisteswissenschaftliches Ideal, daß man sich eins fühlen kann mit dem, was die Menschheit der Vorzeit geschaffen hat, manchmal aus den verborgensten Seelentiefen herauf. Dafür sorgen die Feste, sorgen insbesondere die großen Feste, wenn wir nur ihre in der Zeiten Schrift hineingezeichnete hieroglyphische Zeichenbedeutung uns durch die Wahrheiten der Geistesforschung vor die Seele malen können.
Oh, es ist ein wunderbarer Gedanke, der wie mit einer wunderbaren Empfindung in unserer Seele sich vermählt, wenn wir sehen, wie in jenen Jahrhunderten, die auf das vierte folgten, welches das JesuGeburtstagsfest zuerst auf den 25. Dezember verlegt hat, sich hineingießt in die Seele jener Menschen gerade das Bewußtsein von dem durch die kindliche Natur zu erweckenden Vertrauen, indem in der Malerei, in den Weihnachtsspielen, allüberall sich zeigt, wie vor dem Jesuskinde, vor dem göttlichen Kinde, vor dem göttlichen Ursprung des Menschen sich beugen die Wesen aller Erdenreiche. Es tritt uns entgegen das wunderbare Krippenbild, wie sich die Tiere neigen vor dem Ursprungsmenschen; es gliedern sich daran jene wunderbaren Erzählungen wie etwa diese, daß, als Maria das Jesuskind auf der Reise nach Ägypten getragen hat und die Grenze überschritten worden war, sich ein Baum gebeugt hat, ein uralter Baum vor Maria mit dem Jesusknaben. Daß sich in einer merkwürdigen Weise in der Weihnachtsnacht die Bäume dem großen Ereignis beugen, tritt uns sagenhaft entgegen in den Legenden fast ganz Europas. Wir könnten nach Elsaß, nach Bayern gehen, überall treten uns die Legenden entgegen, wie gewisse Bäume Früchte tragen in der Weihnacht, wie sie sich neigen in der Weihnacht: alles wunderbare Symbole, die ankündigen sollen, wie sich tatsächlich die Geburt des Jesuskindes offenbart als etwas, das mit dem ganzen Leben der Erde zusammenhängt.
Und wenn wir uns an das erinnern, was wir so oft gesagt haben: Wie die uralten spirituellen Strömungen von den Göttern der Menschheit gegeben waren, und wie die Menschen in den Urzeiten hellseherische Einblicke in die göttlich-geistige Welt hatten, wie dieses Hellsehen allmählich schwand, damit die Menschen zur Eroberung des Ich kommen konnten -, wenn man sich vorstellt, wie da in der ganzen menschlichen Organisation etwas vor sich geht wie ein Abdorren, wie ein Dürrwerden der alten Gotteskräfte, und wie ein Durchsetzen der dürren Gotteskräfte mit neuem Lebenswasser durch den Christus-Impuls, durch welchen sich dasjenige vollzieht, was durch das Mysterium von Golgatha geschah: dann erscheint uns dies in einem wunderbaren Bilde, wenn uns die Weihnachtslegenden erzählen, wie die verdorrten und vertrockneten Rosen von Jericho in der Weihenacht von selbst immer aufsprießen. Das war eine Legende, die wir überall im Mittelalter verzeichnet finden, daß die Rosen von Jericho in der Christnacht aufsprießen und sich entfalten, weil sie sich zuerst entfaltet hatten unter den Schritten der Maria, die, als sie auf der Reise nach Ägypten den Jesusknaben trug, über eine Stelle geschritten ist, wo ein Rosenstrauch gewachsen war. Ein wunderbares Symbol für das, was mit den menschlich-göttlichen Kräften geschah, daß selbst so dürre, so leblose Dinge wie Rosen, die man verdorrt am Wege finden kann, die scheinbar tot sind, wieder aufquellen, wieder aufsprießen durch den Christus-Impuls, der eintritt in die Zeitenentwickelung.
Daß dem Menschen so erst gegeben war in Wirklichkeit, was ihm von Ursprung an zugedacht war, das drückt sich aus in dem JesuGeburtsfest, in dem Fest der Geburt des Jesuskindleins. Ehe Adam und Eva waren, war zugedacht der Menschheit - so will man sagen in der Weihnachtslegende — dasjenige, was noch in der ganz unverdorbenen göttlichen Kindesnatur des Menschen liegt. Aber in Wahrheit — wegen des Einflusses Luzifers — hat es die Menschheit erst erlangen können, nachdem der ganze Zeitenverlauf sich abgespielt hatte von Adam und Eva bis zum Mysterium von Golgatha. Oh, man muß sagen, es erweckt tatsächlich eine tiefe Empfindung in unserer Seele, wenn wir, wie zusammengedrängt, in die eine Nacht vom 24. zum 25. Dezember für unser Nachdenken, für unser Nachempfinden das haben, was die Menschheit durch die luziferischen Kräfte geworden ist von Adam und Eva bis zur Geburt des Christus in dem Jesus. Wenn wir das empfinden, dann empfinden wir schon genug die Bedeutung dieses Festes und empfinden dann auch, was man damitvor die Menschheit hinstellen konnte.
Es ist, wie wenn die Menschheit, wenn sie die Gelegenheit benützt, diese Marksteine der Zeit als Meditationsstoffe zu nehmen, wirklich einmal gewahr werden kann ihres reinen Ursprunges in den kosmischen Kräften des Universums. Da den Blick hinaufhebend in die kosmischen Kräfte des Universums und ein wenig eindringend durch 'Theosophia, durch wirkliche spirituelle Weisheit in die Geheimnisse des Universums —, da kann die Menschheit erst wieder reif werden, das zu begreifen, daß eine höhere Stufe des Geburtsfestes des Jesus das ist, was als Christgeburtsfest einmal begriffen worden ist durch die Gnostiker, das Christgeburtsfest, das am 6. Januar eigentlich gefeiert sein sollte, das Fest der Geburt des Christus in dem Leibe des Jesus von Nazareth. Aber, wie um sich vertiefen zu können in die zwölf universellen Kräfte des Kosmos, stehen die zwölf heiligen Nächte da zwischen dem Christfest und dem Fest, das am 6. Januar gefeiert sein sollte, das jetzt das Fest der Heiligen Drei Könige ist, und das eigentlich das charakterisierte Fest ist.
Wieder, ohne daß man es so recht gewußt hat in der bisherigen Wissenschaft, stehen sie da, diese zwölf heiligen Nächte, wie aus den verborgenen weisen Seelentiefen der Menschheit festgesetzt, wie wenn sie sagen wollten: Empfindet alle Tiefe des Christfestes, aber versenkt euch dann während der zwölf heiligen Nächte in die heiligsten Geheimnisse des Kosmos! — Das heißt in das Land des Universums, aus dem der Christus heruntergezogen ist auf die Erde. Denn nur, wenn die Menschheit den Willen haben wird, sich inspirieren zu lassen durch den Gedanken an den heiligen kindlichen Gottesursprung des Menschen, sich inspirieren zu lassen von jener Weisheit, welche in die zwölf Kräfte, in die zwölf heiligen Kräfte des Universums dringt, die symbolisch dargestellt sind in den zwölf Zeichen des Tierkreises, die sich aber nur in Wahrheit darstellen durch die spirituelle Weisheit — nur, wenn die Menschheit sich vertieft in die wahre spirituelle Weisheit und der Zeiten Lauf erkennen lernt im großen Weltenall und im einzelnen Menschen, nur dann wird zu ihrem eigenen Heile die Menschheit der Zukunft, durch Geisteswissenschaft befruchtet, die Inspiration finden, die da kommen kann von dem Jesu-Geburtsfest zum Eindringen in die zuversichtlichsten, hoffnungsreichsten Zukunftsgedanken.
So dürfen wir das Weihnachtsfest auf unsere Seele wirken lassen als ein Inspirationsfest, als ein Fest, das uns den Gedanken des Menschenursprungs in dem heiligen göttlichen Menschenursprungskind so wunderbar vor die Seele führt. Jenes Licht, das in der heiligen Nacht, als Symbol des Menschenlichtes, an seinem Ursprung selber uns erscheint, jenes Licht, das uns in den neueren Zeiten die Lichter des Weihnachtsbaumes symbolisieren: es ist zugleich, richtig verstanden, das Licht, das uns die besten, stärksten Kräfte für unsere nach dem wahren, echten Weltenfrieden, nach der wahren, echten Weltenbeseligung, nach der wahren, echten Weltenhoffnung strebenden Seele geben kann.
Fühlen wir uns durch solche Gedanken an die Taten der Vergangenheit, an die Festsetzungen der Vergangenheit, gekräftigt durch das, was wir immer brauchen an Impulsen für die Zukunft: Weihnachtsgedanken, Erinnerungsgedanken an der Menschheit Ursprung, Gedanken, zugleich wurzelhaft, um sich zu entfalten zur echten, zur kräftigsten Seelenpflanze, zur echten Menschenzukunft.
Christmas – A Festival of Inspiration
In our work within the spiritual scientific movement, we look forward, forward to the future of humanity, and fill our souls and hearts with that which we believe should become part of the evolutionary currents and forces of humanity's future. And even when we look up to the great truths of existence, look up to the forces, powers, and beings that reveal themselves to us in the spiritual world as the causes and fundamental principles of what we encounter in the outer sensory world, even then we are inspired by the knowledge that the truths we thus bring down from the spiritual worlds gradually settle and must settle in the souls and hearts of the people of the future.
Thus, for most of the year, our spiritual gaze is turned either toward the immediate present or toward the future. All the more do we feel compelled, on the memorable days of the year, on the festivals, which are like fixed reminders of what what pre-humanity conceived and devised, protruding from time and its changes into our lives, to feel our connection with this pre-humanity, to immerse ourselves a little in what led the souls and hearts of people in the past to place these landmarks in the course of time, which appear to us as the festivals of the year.
If Easter is such a festival, which, when we understand it, awakens in us thoughts of human powers and the ability to overcome everything base through the higher, everything external and physical through the spiritual, if it is a festival of resurrection, of awakening, a festival of hope and confidence in the spiritual powers that can be awakened in the human soul, then, on the other hand, Christmas is a festival of harmony with the whole cosmos, a festival of grace, a festival that can bring us closer again and again to the thought: No matter how things around us may appear, no matter how bitter doubts may mingle with faith, no matter how the worst disappointments may mingle with the boldest hopes, no matter how all the good things in life may falter around us, there is something in human nature and essence that the properly understood idea of Christmas can tell us, something that can only be brought to life before the soul, spiritually, to reveal to us ever and ever that we are descended from the forces of good, from the forces of right, from the forces of truth. The idea of Easter points us to our victorious forces in the future. In a certain sense, therefore, the idea of Christmas points us to the origin of humankind in the distant past.
On such an occasion, one can clearly see how the unconscious or subconscious reason and spirituality of human beings is far, far higher than what human beings can then comprehend with their consciousness. We often have reason to admire much more what people in the past established from the hidden depths of their souls than what they established from their intellectual thoughts and from what they were able to grasp conceptually. How infinitely wise it seems to us when we open the calendar and find the birth of Christ Jesus recorded for December 25 and then see “Adam and Eve” recorded for December 24. One is tempted to say: vividly, reasonably, spiritually, this could have come to mind from the dull, subconscious creativity of the Middle Ages, when here and there around Christmas time the medieval Christmas plays were performed by people from this or that place. When the “singers,” as they were called, went to perform their Christmas plays, the “paradise tree” was carried in front of them. Just as “Adam and Eve” appeared in the calendar before the feast of Christ's birth, so in the medieval Christmas plays the tree of paradise was carried in front of the troupe as they proceeded to perform these Christmas plays. In short, there was once something that caused the deep, hidden soul of mankind to directly link the earthly beginnings of mankind with the celebration of Jesus' birth. In 353, even in ecclesiastical Rome, December 25 was not yet celebrated as the birthday of Jesus. For it was in 354 that the birthday of Jesus was celebrated for the first time in ecclesiastical Rome on December 25. Before that, something was celebrated that had a similar meaning to the later celebration of Jesus' birthday, namely January 6 as the day commemorating John's baptism in the Jordan, the day commemorating Christ's descent from the spiritual heights and his immersion into the body of Jesus of Nazareth. This was originally the birth of Christ in Jesus, the remembrance of the great historical moment symbolically represented by the dove hovering over the head of Jesus of Nazareth. January 6 was the day of remembrance of the birth of Christ in Jesus of Nazareth.
But in the 4th century, the materialistic worldview that was emerging in the West had long since made it impossible to understand the great idea of the interpenetration of Jesus and Christ. Like a powerful light, this idea was briefly illuminated among the Gnostics, who were in a certain sense contemporaries or immediate successors of the events at Golgotha and were able to understand the depth of this wisdom of the “Christ in Jesus” in the way that we must seek this wisdom again through modern clairvoyance. Instead, the Gnostics were able to see, through the last flickering of ancient, original human clairvoyant powers, what we must regain through the great mysteries of Golgotha. Many things shone forth among the Gnostics that we must recapture, for example, the mystery of the birth of Christ in Jesus of Nazareth at the baptism of John in the Jordan.
But like ancient clairvoyance in general, that peculiar flare of the highest clairvoyant powers, the highest Christmas light of humanity, as it existed among the Gnostics, also faded away for humanity. And by the 4th century, Western Christianity was no longer capable of understanding this great idea. Therefore, in the 4th century, the actual feast of the appearance of Christ in Jesus lost its meaning for Western Christian culture. People had forgotten what this feast of appearance, January 6, actually meant. For a time, even up to the present day, the feeling for the Christ figure in human evolution had to be buried under all kinds of materialistic intellectual debris. And although it was impossible to understand that something supreme for humanity had revealed itself in the baptism of John in the Jordan, it was still possible to understand that the physical organization chosen to receive Christ was something significant, because this did not contradict materialistic consciousness. Therefore, the spiritual birth, which actually came to light in the baptism of John in the Jordan, was pushed back to the birth of Jesus of Nazareth, and the feast of Jesus' birth was substituted for the feast of his appearance.
But even if one was reluctant to express this clearly in most cases, significant feelings, high and sublime feelings, still lived on in what became the Christmas festival for humanity. Something significant always lived on in the human soul when Christmas approached. What one might call the following came to life: when people view the world in the right way, they can still find inspiration in their faith in humanity in the face of certain things, in the face of all the dangers and misfortunes of existence. People can find inspiration in the depths of their souls in the feeling of love and peace in the face of all the disharmony and strife of life.
This is something that always dawns in connection with Christmas, with the celebration of Jesus' birth. For what was it that people actually remembered? Let us understand what was remembered in a spiritual-scientific sense. We know what significant, great, and powerful events human evolution had to go through so that the mystery of Golgotha could break into human evolution. A human being had to be born who was the reincarnated Zarathustra, one of the two Jesus boys. But the one for whom the actual celebration of Jesus' birth was the memorial celebration also had to be born; the one who had remained behind in the spiritual worlds in terms of his soul substance had to be born. As long as humanity had gone through everything that could be experienced through heredity over the generations up to the mystery of Golgotha—all other human souls had passed through the generations—as long as that was the case, humanity had absorbed all the destructive forces that had crept into the blood. Only a single soul substance had remained in the spiritual worlds, guarded by the purest mysteries and the purest places of worship, and was then poured out into humanity as the soul of the second Jesus child, the one described in the Gospel of Luke, that Jesus child whose birth is linked to all memories and representations of the Christmas festival.
At Christmas time, human beings remembered the origin of humanity, the human soul, when it had not yet descended, had not yet descended into Adam's nature. He wanted to say that in Bethlehem, in Palestine, that soul substance was born which did not take part in the descent of humanity, but remained behind and actually entered a human body for the first time by being embodied in the baby Jesus of Luke.
One can believe in humanity, one can have confidence in humanity, and this is how the human soul can feel when its thoughts are allowed to turn to the fact that, however much strife, unbelief, and disharmony have taken hold within human evolution—and they have taken hold through everything that has poured into humanity from Adam's time to the present— if one looks back at what the ancient times called “Adam Kadmon,” which then became the concept of Christ, then trust in the rightness of human power is kindled in the human soul, trust in the original nature of peace and love in humanity is kindled. This is why the subconscious soul immediately linked the celebration of Jesus' birth with the celebration of Adam and Eve, in that human beings actually see their own nature in the Christ Child who is born, but their own nature in its innocence, in its uncorrupted state.
Why was the divine child placed before humanity for centuries, for millennia, as the highest object of worship for the human soul? For the reason that when humans look at the child – when this child has not yet reached the stage where it can say “I” – they can see and know that it is still working on the human body, on the temple of the eternal divine, and because the human being who does not yet say “I” still clearly shows the sign of its origin in the spiritual world. Through this view of the nature of the human child, human beings learn to have complete trust in human nature. Where human beings can most collect themselves, where the sun shines least and warms the globe least, where human beings are not occupied with the ordering of external affairs, where the days are shortest and the nights longest, where all conditions on earth are such that human beings can best collect themselves, can best go into themselves, where all external splendor is hidden from the external gaze for a while, there the Western cultural evolution placed the celebration of the birth of the divine Child, that is, of the human being who is uncorrupted. all external beauty is withdrawn from the external gaze for a while, there the Western cultural development placed the birth celebration of the divine child, that is, of the human being who enters the world uncorrupted and, through his uncorrupted entry into the world, can give human beings, at the time of their most intense gathering, the strongest, the highest confidence through the consciousness of his divine origin.
It is like a confirmation of the great truth that much can be learned from children when one sees that a child's birthday celebration is placed in the course of time as a great, significant celebration of trust in the development of humanity. And so we admire the subconscious, spiritual reason of the people of ancient times who set such milestones in the course of time. We then feel like decipherers of strange hieroglyphs, which have been given to us by the people of ancient times through the inclusion of such festivals in the scriptures of the ages, and we feel at one with these people of ancient times. While our gaze is otherwise turned toward the future, while we are otherwise willing to make our best energies available to the future, to strengthen and reinforce all faith in the future, we try, especially on such festive days, to live in memories that carry old thoughts over to us as if embodied, teaching us that although we can currently only think in our own way about what underlies the outer world in the spiritual realm, but that in earlier times — in a different way, but no less true, no less grand and significant — the true and sublime was thought and felt through empathy with humanity, with everything that humanity is meant to carry to its heights. This is our spiritual-scientific ideal, that we can feel at one with what humanity of old created, sometimes from the most hidden depths of the soul. This is ensured by the festivals, especially the great festivals, if we can only paint their hieroglyphic meanings, inscribed in the script of time, before our souls through the truths of spiritual research.
Oh, it is a wonderful thought that marries itself to our soul with a wonderful feeling when we see how, in those centuries that followed the fourth, which first moved the celebration of Jesus' birthday to December 25, the consciousness of the trust to be awakened by childlike nature poured into the souls of those people, in that in paintings, in Christmas plays, everywhere, the beings of all the realms of the earth bow down before the child Jesus, before the divine child, before the divine origin of man. We are confronted with the wonderful image of the manger, with the animals bowing before the original human being; this is linked to wonderful stories such as the one in which, when Mary was carrying the baby Jesus on her journey to Egypt and had crossed the border, an ancient tree bowed down before Mary and the baby Jesus. That on Christmas night the trees bow in a strange way before the great event is recounted in legends throughout almost all of Europe. We could go to Alsace or Bavaria, and everywhere we would encounter legends about how certain trees bear fruit at Christmas and how they bow down at Christmas: all wonderful symbols that are meant to announce how the birth of the baby Jesus is actually revealed as something connected with the whole life of the earth.
And when we remember what we have said so often: How the ancient spiritual currents were given to humanity by the gods, and how people in primeval times had clairvoyant insights into the divine-spiritual world, how this clairvoyance gradually faded so that people could conquer the ego—if we imagine how something like a withering away is taking place in the entire human organization, like a withering of the old divine forces, and how the dry divine forces are replaced with new life-giving water through the Christ impulse, through which what happened in the Mystery of Golgotha is accomplished: then this appears to us in a wonderful image when the Christmas legends tell us how the withered and dried-up roses of Jericho always spring up by themselves on Christmas Eve. This was a legend that we find recorded everywhere in the Middle Ages, that the roses of Jericho sprout and unfold on Christmas night because they had first unfolded under the footsteps of Mary, who, when she was carrying the baby Jesus on her journey to Egypt, stepped over a place where a rose bush had grown. This is a wonderful symbol of what happened with the human-divine forces, that even such dry, lifeless things as roses, which can be found withered by the wayside, seemingly dead, spring up again through the Christ impulse that enters into the development of time.
That what was intended for human beings from the beginning was only given to them in reality is expressed in the celebration of Jesus' birth, in the celebration of the birth of the baby Jesus. Before Adam and Eve existed, what still lies in the completely unspoiled divine child nature of human beings was intended for humanity, as the Christmas legend tells us. But in truth — because of the influence of Lucifer — humanity was only able to attain this after the entire course of time had unfolded from Adam and Eve to the Mystery of Golgotha. Oh, it must be said that it truly awakens a deep feeling in our souls when, as if huddled together, we have for our reflection and empathy on the night of December 24 to 25 what humanity has become through the Luciferic forces from Adam and Eve to the birth of Christ in Jesus. When we feel this, then we already feel enough of the significance of this festival and then we also feel what could be placed before humanity with it.
It is as if humanity, when it takes the opportunity to use these milestones of time as material for meditation, can truly become aware of its pure origin in the cosmic forces of the universe. For when we lift our gaze to the cosmic forces of the universe and penetrate a little into the mysteries of the universe through 'Theosophia', through real spiritual wisdom, only then can humanity once again become mature enough to understand that a higher stage of the birth of Jesus is what was once understood by the Gnostics as the Christmas festival, the festival of the birth of Christ in the body of Jesus of Nazareth, which should actually be celebrated on January 6. But, as if to enable us to delve deeper into the twelve universal forces of the cosmos, the twelve holy nights stand between Christmas and the festival that should be celebrated on January 6, which is now the Feast of the Three Kings, and which is actually the festival that characterizes it.
Once again, without anyone really knowing it in previous science, these twelve holy nights stand there, as if determined from the hidden depths of the human soul, as if they wanted to say: Feel all the depth of Christmas, but then immerse yourselves in the most sacred mysteries of the cosmos during the twelve holy nights! That is, into the land of the universe from which Christ descended to earth. For only when humanity has the will to be inspired by the thought of the holy, childlike divine origin of the human being, to be inspired by that wisdom which penetrates the twelve forces, the twelve sacred forces of the universe, symbolically represented in the twelve signs of the zodiac, but which can only be truly understood through spiritual wisdom — only then when humanity immerses itself in true spiritual wisdom and learns to recognize the passage of time in the great universe and in the individual human being, only then will the humanity of the future, fertilized by spiritual science, find the inspiration that can come from the celebration of Jesus' birth to penetrate the most confident and hopeful thoughts about the future.
Thus we may allow Christmas to work upon our souls as a festival of inspiration, as a festival that so wonderfully brings before our souls the thought of the origin of the human being in the holy divine Child, the origin of the human being. That light which appears to us on the holy night as a symbol of the light of humanity at its very origin, that light which in more recent times is symbolized by the lights of the Christmas tree: is, when properly understood, the light that can give us the best and strongest forces for our souls striving for true, genuine world peace, for true, genuine world happiness, for true, genuine world hope.
Let us feel strengthened by such thoughts of the deeds of the past, of the decisions of the past, by what we always need as impulses for the future: Christmas thoughts, thoughts of remembrance of the origin of humanity, thoughts that are at the same time rooted, so that they can unfold into genuine, powerful plants of the soul, into a genuine future for humanity.