Christ Impulse - meeting of two streams

With the Mystery of Golgotha, the Earth was fructified with the Christ Impulse as Christ became the spirit of the Earth and future group soul of humanity. This Christ Impulse travelled over the centuries from the area of Golgotha towards Europe, subconsciously in the heart of Men and also as a knowledge stream. Meanwhile there was also the old form of Christianity, of seeing Christ in the elements of nature. The latter stream is represented by the pagan christianity, the Hibernian mysteries, and the Arthur stream. See Schema FMC00.113 below, lower left.

See below for the Two streams of development, referenced as the Northern and the Southern streams. Both streams met at the end of the Fourth (Greco-Roman) cultural age and this was the start of the new consciousness, see also Schema FMC00.167. All this was preparation for the Current fifth cultural age with the consciousness soul required for fructification with the Christ Impulse, and giving its fruits in the next Sixth cultural age (see a.o. Schema FMC00.190 and Schema FMC00.428A)

Rudolf Steiner describes the meeting of the two streams in the 9th century, and it is in this area that also the story of Parsifal plays (most probably, no exact historical timing is known). This important milestone also coincides with the 8th oecumenical council of the Catholic church that banned the spirit and declared that Man consists only of body and soul - see the 869 topic page.

These above has to be put into perspective of an important transition towards the consciousness soul, whereby the previous guidance of the spiritual hierarchies was let loose and descended into Man. As the ancient form of clairvoyance and old wisdom subsided and disappeared, the new was being developed and arise with the rosecrucian impulse. Hence the ancient traditions of the Arthur stream over the legend of the Holy Grail was brought into the new era with Parsifal, the new form of consciousness, Man's independant free will and thinking, and also the new forms of knowledge and initiation, leading to the new form of clairvoyance that will arise naturally from this.

Southern and Northern streams

For more extended coverage, this subtopic was moved to a dedicated topic page: Two streams of development.

Aspects

• Christ Impulse stream moving from East to West (1913-10-14-GA152 and 1914-01-02-GA149)
• The Two streams of development (1920-02-08-GA196), based on their history, approached Christianity differently. In the South: Gnosis and understanding of Christ; in the North: feeling experience of Jesus (1916-12-21-GA173)
  • The Northern stream would have a feeling of the Jesus Mystery (and Christmas), a child who comes into the world to save mankind (based on unconscious feelings based on ancient customs). The Roman catholic church transformed this Christmas Mystery into something innocuous.
  • The Southern stream had more of an understanding of the Christ Mystery (and Easter), eg in Gnosis. This was destroyed root and branch by dogma and the Roman catholic church.
    • 4th century: college for destruction of initiation, gnosis, spirit (re below ao 1922-07-16-GA213 and 1922-07-23-GA214, and Discussion section)
• 9th century: the meeting of the two streams around 869 - see Schema FMC00.113
  • see also quote D on Germanic mythology#1905-12-10-GA90B (and 1905-03-22-GA90B on that page), to be read in conjunction with Schema FMC00.432 on Current Postatlantean epoch.
  • in the context how history can be viewed by symptoms of underlying realities rising to the current, example of around 800 AD between two philosophers, examples of different states of soul, the more spiritual-still Platonic thinking and the more modern intellectual Aristotelian (1920-10-17-GA200)

• specific case illustration: theological argument debate around 800AD between Alcuin (ca 735-804, a highly regarded English scholar and teacher at the court of Charlemagne) and a Greek philosopher also living in the kingdom of the Franks but with the inherited particular Greek soul constitution (1920-10-17-GA200).
  • The specific case is an illustration of two views are clashing here which arise out of completely different constitu­tions of soul, and which, "when we go into the differences between these two modes of human thought we find important historical impulses".
    • The Greek represented the Greek culture of Plato, as "in Plato there was still something alive of the ancient wisdom of humanity which takes us across to the ancient Orient wherein ancient times a primal wisdom had lived". So the Greek culture is positioned as "a sort of last offshoot of the oriental constitution of soul", with which the end of the Southern stream is described.
    • Alcuin represents Aristotelianism, whereby Aristotle is just the first grasp (sounding as a first quiet note from within his Greek cultural origin), of "another culture that was long prepared and arose later in the central regions of civilisation". With this the Northern stream is described.
• The site of Odilienberg or Mount Sainte-Odile in France as an example of the flowing together of the old pagan stream with the emerging Christ Impulse. See Druidic and Trotten mysteries#Odilienberg or Mount Sainte-Odile
• the link of this topic with Parsifal and the Holy Grail, see Christ Module 6

Inspirational quotes

The quotes below trigger a question for understanding what is meant with 'moving from east to west', which is the topic for this page.

1924-08-27-GA240

the Christ moving from East to West in hearts of men, through Greece, Northern Africa, Italy, Spain, across Europe .. while over in the West He was working through nature.

1913-10-14-GA152

Thus Christ appeared in spiritual form .. and he went in spirit through Greece, Rome, up to the Germans, from east to west and from there to the north

1914-01-02-GA149

Whence did the Christ come? How did He come when He came from on high to be the Lord of the Earth?

He passed from the West to the East, and from the East He returned to the West.

His external physical covering came down from the realm of the higher Hierarchies. The Beings of those Hierarchies brought it down; it belonged to them.

Illustrations

Schema FMC00.113 depicts the meeting of two streams of Christ experience: the old 'outer' pagan christianity seeing the spiritual sun in nature's elements, and the new 'inner' christianity living in the hearts of Man. This leads to the struggle and change symbolized by the Parsifal story. Parsifal does not have to search or find the grail externally but in his own heart, symbolized by the 'asking questions'. See also: Christ Module 6 - principle in image and story.

For background on the two streams, see also Germanic mythology, and compare with Schema FMC00.432 on this page as well as Current Postatlantean epoch.

Schema FMC00.438 illustrates the essential agenda for humanity in the Current Postatlantean epoch to develop the first spiritual principle of Man's higher triad, the spirit-self (or manas) - see Schema FMC00.130. This will be achieved for a large part of humanity in the sixth cultural age (light yellow) as the fruits of the fructification of the consciousness soul by the Christ Impulse (see text in red, and the two mini infographics - see also Schema FMC00.428A).

This critical period of the fourth to the sixth cultural ages was prepared in the first four cultural ages (see Recapitulation - Schema FMC00.168), in parallel in a Southeastern and Northwestern stream (see Two streams of development). Both streams relate to the Atlantean migrations and the development of body and soul in the different populations (see also Human races). The Northwestern stream was in a preparatory waiting mode for four ages, see what is discussed on the topic pages available from both Germanic mythology and Mystery School tradition, a.o. but not limited to Ragnarok, Nibelungen, Druidic and Trotten Mysteries, Wotan Impulse, etc).

The spiral below (see also Schema FMC00.169) illustrates how evolution proceeds in discrete jumps, and the whole Schema is a concrete example of that in more detail. The central node of the spiral happens between the fourth to sixth cultural ages, of which the fifth is pivotal or central.

This positions the truly pivotal nature and importance of the current times, as the Christ Impulse is to fructify the consciousness soul so as to get the fruits required for this whole epoch in the next cultural age (Schema FMC00.169A). See also Schema FMC00.052: the next three millenia are crucial, and the current (and next) incarnation(s) is and are therefore pivotal.

Additional schemas that complement this schema: Schema FMC00.432, Schema FMC00.205B and Schema FMC00.441 below

Last, the Mystery of Golgatha in the center of the spiral is not just central to the current epoch, but to the whole Earth cycle and the evolution of the solar system cosmos: it is the start of a new creation, see Schema FMC00.400 on Cosmic breath of Brahma. For perspective, see also the PDF file The great journey of humanity.

Schema FMC00.432 shows a geographical view on the Current Postatlantean epoch, with the center of culture over millenia moving across the Southern most advanced stream described extensively by spiritual science. Meanwhile the Northern stream developed differently, as expressed in the Northern Scandinavian and Germanic mythology and ancient Mystery tradition, with initiation centers such as the Hibernian, Druidic and Trotten Mysteries (see Schema FMC00.437).

It is important to realize that the development of humanity was not limited to the key cultures highlighted in the descriptive labels given to characterize each cultural age. For example the Mayan and Jewish cultures also belong to the third 'Egypto-Chaldean' cultural age. Also the Chinese culture is not a focus in the descriptions of the development of humanity.

Also shown are for reference are the Gobi desert and Tibet, see the migrations on Schemas FMC00.205 and variants on Atlantean epoch. For the geographical movement of the epicentrum of cultural height across the globe, see Schema FMC00.211 on Human races.

Schema FMC00.205B is based on a drawing by Gunther Wachsmuth. The Northern and Southern streams have been highlighted.

The link can be made with the statements by Rudolf Steiner that (a) the Jupiter mysteries were available in the Northern stream people of North and West Europe, as well that (b) the Germanic people were intrinsically related with the Persian culture. Furthermore it can also used to imagine another statement that (c) the Southern stream was more linked to the Lemurian epoch cultures (one can think into this: old souls, early descents and many incarnations), and the Northern was more related to the Atlantean epoch and culture (see quote B on Germanic mythology#1905-12-10-GA90B).

Furthermore note how the Black Sea area is really central between Northern and Southern streams (see Colchis Mysteries with the impulse for the intellectual soul in the fourth cultural age which brings these two streams together, see Buddha and Wotan Impulse, eg Schema FMC00.437), but also how it lies central between the East and West.

Schema FMC00.441 is a navigational aid schema: the green boxes represent topic pages on this wiki, related as represented graphically.

The schema shows that Ancient history of myths and legends is a representation of ancient Mystery School tradition in cultures, incl. initiatory processes and a previous more primeval form of spiritual science. Whereas the Southern is most well known, the Northern stream is much less known and understood. The latter needs to be approached in a different way, see the topic pages on the lower right. This background is required in order to see how the encompassing importance picture of the two streams emerges, and how it relates to Christianity (see middle: shepards/magi and Christmas/Eastern affinity).

See also: The Michaelic stream#Substream polarities where this is framed broader, as one can zoom out and link back to the descent of human spirits to Earth and the evolution of the main Human races.

Schema FMC00.167 provides "a two millenia overview" of the cultural age of the intellectual soul, with focus on the preparations and overflow into the consciousness soul. In Rudolf Steiner lectures, key dates come back of the 4th century, the 9th century, the year 1250, and the first part of the 15th century. All these are related as shown in the green and blue bars on top, showing a gradual process centered around the 'kick-in' point of the 4th century, but starting 5 centuries earlier and having its effect until 5 centuries later (darker blue). This is the peiod of handover of SoF to archai, the great curtain was now finally let down over the ancient atavistic clairvoyance and old wisdom (see eg old knowledge phase out, upto the School of Chartres). At the same time it is also a new beginning of a form of new thinking of which Scotus Eriugena was a very early post, which saw its rising with scholasticism, and that really 'hit' the whole of humanity from the 15th century onwards. This gave rise to the new autonomeous thinking by Man, and the development of mineral science. Around 1250 is when the SoF weave the consciousness soul, and in the first third of the 15th century the first hierarchy, in some sort of 'cosmic thunderstorm', 'hard-codes the wiring' into Man's physical system, the sense-nerve subsystem.

The above chart is focused on the transition of the consciousness soul, it does not show the new Michael era starting 1879 and the new form of clairvoyance that appears from 20-21st century onwards (see Christ in the etheric). It also does not show the counter-events of the two Thirty Years Wars, the first from 1618-1648 countering the Rosecrucian impulse, and the second from 1914-1945 to counter the Michael impulse and distort the German-Slavic cultural and spiritual developments.

Schema FMC00.013 is added below because the above schema FMC00.167 fits into this FMC00.013, that zooms out to the whole Current Postatlantean epoch, where it represents the 'lowest' fourth cultural age. It positions well that we are, even after five centuries, still at in the first half of the developing fifth cultural age.

The fifth and sixth cultural ages are decisive ( see 1910-GA013 quote on the Current Postatlantean epoch, as well as Schema FMC00.169A on Overlapping evolutionary periods.

Lecture coverage and references

Reference extracts

1909-08-27-GA113

For context sketch preceeding this quote, see longer extract on: Two streams of development#1909-08-27-GA113

[Meeting of two streams]

We ourselves live at a time when the two streams must unite as the male and female fertilising substances of plants coalesce; we live at a time when

• the Christ who was drawn from outside as an objective Being into the purified body of Jesus of Nazareth must be understood through deep contemplation on the part of the soul,
• and its union with the world of spirit to be discovered in the inner being, the world arising from Lucifer's kingdom.

In this way will come to pass the mutual fertilisation of these two evolutionary streams of men.

It has already begun; it began at the moment indicated in the story which tells us that the sacrificial blood of the Christ flowing from the cross was received into the vessel of the Holy Grail and brought to the West from the East, where preparation for the understanding of the incarnation of Christ had been made in a very definite way by cultivating that which represents the light of Lucifer.

In this way the union of these two streams in humanity will become more and more complete. Whatever mankind of the present time may say or do, the healing of the future humanity will be accomplished by the fact that within the union of the two streams, the mighty Christ Being, guiding as He does the evolution of the universe and of man, is understood through the light received by the soul from within, out of the kingdom of Lucifer.

Christ will give the substance, Lucifer the form, and from their union will arise impulses which shall permeate the spiritual evolution of mankind, and bring about what the future has in store for the healing and the blessing of the peoples.

1913-10-01-GA148

What is it then which spreads? What is so curious? .. What is it? ..

It is Christ himself, who goes from heart to heart, soul to soul, who traverses the world over the centuries, whether or not people understand him!

1913-10-14-GA152

So erschien Christus in geistiger Gestalt. Und er zog im Geiste durch Griechenland, Rom, bis zu den Germanen herauf, von Osten nach Westen und von da nach Norden

freely translated

Thus Christ appeared in spiritual form. And he went in spirit through Greece, Rome, up to the Germans, from east to west and from there to the north

1914-01-02-GA149

explains (west -> east and then again -> west)

We see today how this picture of the Zodiac has been imprinted in the soul of the Earth, the aura of the Earth, and let us work gradually towards the other part of Kepler's world-picture — the part which had to remain in the subconscious depths of the soul but shows clearly that what we can give today as a cosmology is a fulfilment of it. Just as our Anthroposophy — or what Anthroposophy should mean to us — must be deeply grounded in the evolution of humanity, so is it inwardly connected with the admonition which resounds to us from the Holy Grail.

And if we look at Europe, the Western land of ancient times, and see what memories of the Atlantean epoch lived on into Postatlantean times; if we see how in the Greek world a last faint echo, sounded, showing how the Nathan Jesus had once been permeated by the Christ in the higher worlds, the Jesus who then descended and accomplished the Mystery of Golgotha — then, if we follow that out, we may ask:

Whence did the Christ come? How did He come when He came from on high to be the Lord of the Earth?

He passed from the West to the East, and from the East He returned to the West.

His external physical covering came down from the realm of the higher Hierarchies. The Beings of those Hierarchies brought it down; it belonged to them.

The Parsifal saga reminds us of this in a beautiful way when it says:

“A host of angels brought to Titurel the Holy Grail, the true Mystery of the Christ Jesus, of the connection between the Lord of the Earth and the Virgin Mother; and a host of angels awaits it again in the realm of the higher hierarchies.”

Let us seek it there; and then we shall gradually come to understand what our anthroposophical world-conception is seeking; we shall gradually press on further and further towards a feeling, a perception, of the celestial aspect of the Holy Grail and thence to its human aspect, to the Mother with the Jesus, the Christ.

1916-12-21-GA173

SWCC

[Gnosis - wisdom of the Christ]

As the time approached when human evolution was to take into itself the Christ-Being there came about a possibility, like an inheritance from the ancient days of clairvoyant wisdom, of gaining a picture, an idea of the whole lofty stature of the Christ-Being. There existed at this time a wisdom about which people often speak today in what could be called a sacrilegious way, though they have scarcely any idea of what it represented. It was something which has now been eliminated from human evolution by certain streams which are opposed to more profound Christian revelation. This was Gnosis, a wisdom into which much of the knowledge revealed to mankind by ancient, atavistic clairvoyance had flowed. Every last fragment of Gnosis, both verbal and written, had been rooted out by western dogmatic Christianity, but not until Gnosis had also endeavoured to find an answer to the question: Who is Christ?

... Gnosis was something powerful, something great, ... time nineteen centuries ago when it endeavoured to give some kind of an answer to the question: Who is Christ?

The spiritual eye of the Gnostic saw the spiritual worlds. He thought of the spiritual hierarchies arranged in a wonderful way, rank upon rank. He also saw how Christ strode down through the world of the spiritual hierarchies in order to enter into the enveloping bodies of a mortal human being. All this was revealed to the soul of the Gnostic. And this soul strove to gain a picture of how Christ came down from spiritual heights and was received on earth. You can gain an idea of the scale of these events if you imagine that everything that has come into the world since the elimination of Gnosis has been small and petty in comparison with the mighty Christ-picture of the Gnostics. The Mystery-wisdom that lies behind the Gospels is infinitely great, greater than anything that subsequent theology has been capable of finding in them.

In order to understand how small and insignificant is today's customary understanding of the Christ-Being compared with that of Gnosis, you might try to immerse yourselves in the Christ-idea of the ancient Gnostics. When you place this before your soul you will grovel in the dust before the greatness of this picture of the Christ-Being Who came down from spiritual heights, spiritual distances, spiritual breadths into a human body. So, long ago, there was once amongst human beings a lofty concept of Christ. It has receded now. For all those dogmas that came into being subsequently, the creeds of Arius or Athanasius or whatever, are trifling compared with the Gnostic concept which combined wisdom about the structure of the universe with the view of the Christ-Being. Only remnants of this great Gnostic concept of Christ remain.

This is one aspect of the relationship of Christ to Jesus, namely, that Christ came into the world at a time when the wisdom which could have comprehended Him, which had endeavoured to comprehend Him, had already been stamped out. Yet, all along, those who spoke of Gnosis as an oriental fantasy which had to be stamped out for the good of western man considered themselves good Christians. In truth, it was only the incapacity of that time, its incapacity to link earthly concepts with heavenly concepts. You really need a sense of tragedy if you want to understand human evolution.

... The Gnostics were the last stragglers of those bearers of that wisdom which was extensive and intensive enough to understand something of Christ out of man's ancient, atavistic earth-wisdom. That is one side of the relationship between Christ and Jesus. At that time the Christ-Being could have been comprehended by Gnosis. But this was not part of the plan of evolution, although in what had been Gnosis there had been contained the full wisdom of the Christ.

[Southern stream - extinguishing understanding of Christ]

But now it can be said that the path taken by Christianity through the countries of the South — through Greece, Italy, Spain and so on — was suited to extinguishing more and more the knowledge of what Christ really was. Rome in decline, Rome in disintegration was destined to extinguish the understanding of Christ.

It is a remarkable thing that, on the one hand, the relationship of Christ to Jesus worked in such a way that,

• in Gnosis, a high concept of Christ shines out and then dies away as Christianity passes through the Roman element,
• and that, on the other hand, when Christianity meets the peoples coming down towards it from the North, the concept of Jesus starts to take shape.

[North - feeling experience of Jesus]

The concept of Christ has died away in the South. Then, in the North, the concept of Jesus appears, certainly not in a lofty way, but in a way that speaks to the souls of human beings; something wonderful enters human souls at the thought of how a child is born in a consecrated night, a child who will take the Christ into himself. Just as in the South the concept of Christ was inadequate, so in the North was the feeling for Jesus. Nevertheless, the feeling was such that it deeply moved people's hearts; yet, in itself, it is not fully comprehensible. You have only to compare the greatness and majesty of what Christ Jesus means for human evolution with all the sentimental trifles contained in so many poems and songs about the ‘darling infant Jesus’, which move the hearts of those who, in their egoism, believe that they are experiencing heavenly ecstasies. If you make this comparison you gain an immediate impression of something that wants to enter into life but cannot quite do so, something that combines with that other in such a way that the whole deeper meaning and significance remains in man's subconscious.

Now what is it that remains in man's subconscious while the concept of Jesus, the feeling for Jesus, the experience of Jesus rises to the surface?

It is extraordinary how this happened! The understanding of Christ sank down into the subconscious and the understanding of Jesus began to glow in the subconscious. In man's subconscious, not in consciousness, which was powerless, there was to be a meeting and a balancing out of the Christ consciousness which was fading and the Jesus consciousness which was beginning to glow in the subconscious.

Why did the peoples who came down from Scandinavia, from what is today northern Russia, not take up in Christianity the Christ idea which, to begin with, remained utterly unknown to them? Why did they take up the Jesus idea in Christianity? Why was it the Christmas festival which, above all, spoke to human hearts, awakening in them infinite feelings of holy tenderness? Why was this? What was there in this Europe which received from the South what was basically an utterly disfigured Christianity? What was there in this Europe that caused that idea to light up in people's hearts, that idea in which the Christmas festival with its deep, deep content of feeling is experienced?

The people had been prepared but, to a certain extent, they had forgotten what had prepared them. They had been prepared out of the ancient northern Mysteries. But they had forgotten the meaning of the ancient northern Mysteries. To discover, out of the inner meaning of the northern Mysteries, that deep secret of how the feeling for Jesus entered into European soul life it is necessary to go very far back indeed.

1916-09-17-GA171

shows how the anticipated development (see the cosmic plan in Occult atom) is very slow and gradual, and the forces of opposition kick in with their full weight at specific points.

.

In other lectures, Steiner describes the origin and intentions of Ghenghis Khan but also before of the Huns, which was about the period describes above in the 1922-07-23-GA214 quote. Hence these two can be taken together as attacks of the 'counterforces'.

The luciferic and ahrimanic powers are working in this fifth post-Atlantean age to disturb these forces in the human soul, to employ them to a wrong end, thus bringing men's souls out of the earth sphere to establish a new sphere of their own. Many things must work together to disturb the right, quiet and slow unfolding of these forces.

Note well that I say the quiet and slow unfolding because the entire period of 2,160 years, starting in 1413 A.D., should be used for the gradual unfoldment of the forces I have named, that is, free imaginations and the gradual development of working with primal phenomena. At intervals — by fits and starts, as it were — the luciferic and ahrimanic powers throw the whole weight of their opposition against this right evolution. When we bear in mind that everything is prepared for by the world beyond the earth long before it happens, we shall then not be surprised to find preparations being made to bring the strongest possible forces of opposition against the normal evolution of humanity.

...

and

Then the new age of the fifth cultural period dawned. Its main feature was the further development of intellectual abilities, which blossomed exuberantly then and will continue to unfold in the present and future. A gradual buildup to this period began in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and its progress accelerated from the sixteenth century onward into the present.

Under these influences, cultivating the forces of reason became the chief concern of evolution in the fifth cultural period.

In contrast, traditional knowledge of and confidence in a supersensible world lost more and more of its power over human souls. However, it was replaced by what we may call an increasingly strong influx into human souls of knowledge derived from modern supersensible consciousness. “Hidden” knowledge was now flowing, although imperceptibly to begin with, into people’s ways of thinking. It is self-evident that intellectual forces have continued to reject this knowledge right into the present.

But what must happen will happen in spite of any temporary rejection.

Symbolically, this hidden knowledge, which is taking hold of humanity from the other side and will do so increasingly in the future, can be called “the knowledge of the Grail.” If we learn to understand the deeper meaning of this symbol as it is presented in stories and legends, we will discover a significant image of what has been described above as the new initiation knowledge with the Christ mystery at its center.

Therefore, modern initiates can also be known as “Grail Initiates.”

1920-10-17-GA200

I have often mentioned that spiritual science, if it looks at history, would actually have to pursue a symptomatology; a symptomatology constituted from the fact that one is aware that behind what takes it course as the stream of physical-sensible facts lie the driving spiritual forces. But everywhere in historical development there are times when what has real being and essence (das eigentlich Wesenhafte) comes as a symptom to the surface and can be judged discerningly from the phenomena only if one has the possibility to penetrate more deeply from one's awareness of these phenomena into the depths of historical development.

[Diagram 800 AD]

I would like to clarify this by a simple diagram. Let us suppose that this is a flow of historical facts (see diagram). The driving forces lie, for ordinary observation, below the flow of these facts. And if the eye of the soul observes the flow in this way, then the real activity of the driving forces would lie beneath it (red).

But there are significant points in this flow of facts. And these significant points are distinguished by the fact that what is otherwise hidden comes here to the surface. Thus we can say: Here, in a particular phenomenon, which must only be properly evaluated, it was possible to become aware of some­thing which otherwise is at work everywhere, but which does not show itself in such a significant manifestation.

Let us assume that this (see diagram) took place in some year of world history, let us say around 800 AD.

What was significant for Europe, Europe, let us say for Western Europe, was of course at work before this and worked on afterwards, but it did not manifest itself in such a significant way in the time before and after as it did here.

If one points to a way of looking at history like this, a way which looks to significant moments, such a method would be in complete accord with Goetheanism. For Goethe wished in general that all perception of the world should be directed to significant points and then, from what could be seen from such points, the remaining content of world events be recognized. Goethe says of this that,

“within the abundance of facts, the important thing is to find a significant point from which the neighbouring areas can be viewed and from which much can be deciphered.”

So let us take this year 800 AD. We can point here to a fact in the history of Western European humanity which, from the point of view of the usual approach to history, might seem insignificant — which one would perhaps not find worthy of attention for what is usually called history — but which, nevertheless, for a deeper view of humanity's development, is indeed significant.

Around this year there was a kind of learned theological argument between the man who was a sort of court philosopher of the Frankish realm, Alcuinli; and a Greek also living at that time in the kingdom of the Franks.

• The Greek, who was naturally at home in the particular soul-constitution of the Greek peoples which he had inherited, had wanted to reach a discerning judgement of the principles of Christianity and had come to the concept of redemption. He put the question: To whom, in the redemption through Christ Jesus, was the ransom actually paid? He, the Greek thinker, came to the solution that the ransom had been paid to Death. Thus, in a certain sense, it was a sort of redemption theory that this Greek developed from his thoroughly Greek mode of thinking, which was now just becoming acquainted with Christianity. The ransom was paid to Death by the cosmic powers.
•  Alcuin, who stood at that time in that theological stream which then became the determining one for the development of the Roman Catholic Church of the West, debated in the following way about what the Greek had argued. He said: Ransom can only be paid to a being who really exists. But death has no reality, death is only the outer limit of reality, death itself is not real and, therefore, the ransom money could not have been paid to Death.

Now criticism of Alcuin's way of thinking is not what matters here. For to someone who, to a certain extent, can see through the interrelations of the facts, the view that death is not something real resembles the view which says: Cold is not something real, it is just a decrease in warmth, it is only a lesser warmth. Because the cold isn't real I won't wear a winter coat in winter because I'm not going to protect myself against some­thing that isn't real. But we will leave that aside.

We want rather to take the argument between Alcuin and the Greek purely positively and will ask what was really happening there. For it is indeed quite noticeable that it is not the concept of redemption itself that is discussed. It is not discussed in such a way that in a certain sense both personalities, the Greek and the Roman Catholic theologian, accept the same point of view, but in such a way that the Roman Catholic theologian shifts the standpoint entirely before he takes it up at all. He does not go on speaking in the way he had just done, but moves the whole problem into a completely different direction. He asks: Is death something real or not? and objects that, indeed, death is not real.

This directs us at the outset to the fact that two views are clashing here which arise out of completely different constitu­tions of soul. And, indeed, this is the case.

• The Greek continued, as it were, the direction which, in the Greek culture, had basically faded away between Plato and Aristotle. In Plato there was still something alive of the ancient wisdom of humanity; that wisdom which takes us across to the ancient Orient where, indeed, in ancient times a primal wisdom had lived — but which had then fallen more and more into decadence. In Plato, if we are able to understand him properly, we find the last offshoots, if I can so call them, of this primal oriental wisdom. And then, like a rapidly developing metamor­phosis, Aristotelianism sets in which, fundamentally, presents a completely different constitution of soul from the Platonic one. Aristotelianism represents a completely different element in the development of humanity from Platonism. And, if we follow Aristotelianism further, it, too, takes on different forms, different metamorphoses, but all of which have a recognizable similarity. Thus we see how Platonism lives on like an ancient heritage in this Greek who has to contend against Alcuin, and how
• in Alcuin, on the other hand, Aristotelianism is already present.

.

And we are directed, by looking at these two individuals, to that fluctuation which took place on European soil between two — one cannot really say world-views — but two human constitutions of soul

• one of which has its origin in ancient times in the Orient,
• and another, which we do not find in the Orient but which, entering in later, arose in the central regions of civilization and was first grasped by Aristotle. In Aristotle, however, this only sounds a first quiet note, for much of Greek culture was still alive in him. It develops then with particular vehemence in the Roman culture within which it had been prepared long before Aristotle, and, indeed, before Plato.

So that we see how, since the eighth century BC on the Italian peninsula a particular culture, or the first hints of it, was being prepared alongside that which lived on the Greek peninsula as a sort of last offshoot of the oriental constitution of soul.

And when we go into the differences between these two modes of human thought we find important historical impulses. For what is expressed in these ways of thinking went over later into the feeling life of human beings; into the configuration of human actions and so on

1922-07-23-GA214

tells the story of the 'college for destruction of initiation, gnosis, spirit' in a descriptive context of Man's position to the spiritual world

Then the following happened: the Roman world, which the Christian impulse followed in its greatest westward development, was permeated in its spiritual understanding with an inclination, a fondness, for the abstract. The Romans tended to translate perceptions, observations, and insights into abstract concepts. However, the Roman world was actually decaying and falling apart while Christianity gradually spread toward the west. And, in addition, the northern peoples were pushing from the eastern part of Europe into the west and the south.

Now, it is remarkable that, at the very time Rome was decaying and the fresh peoples from the north were arriving, a college was created on the Italian peninsula, a collegium concerning which I spoke recently [see 1922-07-16-GA213], which set for itself the task of using all these events to completely root out the old views and modes of seeing, to allow to survive for posterity only those writings which this college felt comfortable with.

History reports nothing concerning these events; nevertheless, they were real. If such a history did exist, it would point out how this college was created as a successor to the pontifical college of ancient Rome. Everything that this college did not allow was thoroughly swept away and what remained was modified before being passed on to posterity. Just as Rome invented the last will and testament as a part of its national economic order so that the dispositions of the individual human will could continue to work beyond the individual's life, so there arose in this college the desire to have the essence of Rome live on in the following ages of historical development if only as an inheritance, as the mere sum of dogmas that had been developed over many generations.

“For as long as possible nothing new shall be seen in the spiritual world” — so decreed this college. “The principle of initiation shall be completely rooted out and destroyed. Only the writings we are now modifying are to survive for posterity.”

1923-12-09-GA232

And now two great streams met, one stream of which we may say — for all that I am saying now is simply a relation of facts, not in any way letting fall a shadow of sympathy or antipathy but simply describing actual history — two streams met,

• one which in a roundabout way came from the East through Greece and Rome. This movement which took into account the endowment or talents more and more breaking in upon humanity, depending merely on the power of reason and the senses, occupied itself with that which existed as historic memory of externally visible, externally experienced events. From Palestine the news spread through Greece and Rome, which was taken up by men into their religious life, the news of what had taken place in the physical-sense World through the God Christ. This reckoned upon the human understanding, which by this time was dependent upon what today we call the ordinary consciousness bound up with the reason and the senses. This stream spread in the most magnificent way.
• But it finally overwhelmed that stream which came over from the West, from Hibernia, which as a last echo of the ancient instinctive earth-wisdom relied on the ancient treasures of wisdom of humanity, which were now to be illuminated by the new consciousness. Something spread over Europe from Hibernia which did not take into account illumination with the wisdom founded on sense perception, or proofs which could demonstrate that which had taken place historically. But cults, wisdom teachings as Hibernian cults, Hibernian wisdom teachings spread abroad which were based on illumination from the Spiritual world, from the Spiritual world even at the identical time when as in the case of the Mystery of Golgotha, the event was taking place in physical reality on another spot of earth. The physical reality of Palestine was seen spiritually in Hibernia.

1924-08-27-GA240

quote A

Yonder in Asia the Mystery of Golgotha had taken place and its impulse had penetrated deeply into the hearts and souls of men. We need only think of those who became the first Christians to realise what a change had come about in their souls. While all this of which I have been telling you was happening in the West, the Christ Himself, the Christ Who had come down to earth leaving His Spirit-Man on the Sun and His Life-Spirit in the atmosphere around the earth, bringing down His Ego and His Spirit-Self to the earth — the Christ was moving from East to West in the hearts of men, through Greece, Northern Africa, Italy, Spain, across Europe. The Christ worked here in the hearts of men, while over in the West He was working through nature.

And so

• on the one hand we have the story of the Mystery of Golgotha, legible in the Book of Nature for those who were able to read it, working from West to East. It represented, as it were, the science of the higher graduates of King Arthur's Round Table. And
• on the other hand we have a stream flowing from East to West, not in wind and wave, in air and water, not over hills or in the rays of the Sun, but flowing through the blood, laying hold of the hearts of men on its course from Palestine through Greece into Italy and Spain.

The one stream flows through nature; the other through the blood and the hearts of men.

These two streams flow to meet one another.

• The pagan stream is still working, even today. It bears the pre-Christian Christ, the Christ Who was proclaimed as a Sun Being by those who were Knights of the Round Table, but also by many others before the Mystery of Golgotha actually took place. The pre-Christian Christ was carried through the world by this stream even in the age of the Mystery of Golgotha. And a great deal of this wisdom was carried forth into the world by the stream known as that of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. It is possible, even to-day, to discover these things. There is a pagan Christianity, a Christianity that is not directly bound up with the actual historical Event of Golgotha.
• And coming upwards to meet this stream there is the form of Christianity that is connected directly with the Mystery of Golgotha, flowing through the blood, through the hearts and souls of men.

Two streams come to meet one another — the pre-Christian Christ stream, etherealised as it were, and the Christian Christ stream. The one is known, subsequently, as the Arthur stream; the other as the Grail stream. Later on they came together; they came together in Europe, above all in the spiritual world.

How can we describe this movement? The Christ Who descended through the Mystery of Golgotha drew into the hearts of men. In the hearts of men He passed from East to West, from Palestine, through Greece, across Italy and Spain. The Christianity of the Grail spread through the blood and the hearts of men. The Christ took His way from East to West.

And to meet Him from the West there came the spiritual etheric Image of the Christ — the Image evoked by the Mystery of Golgotha, but still picturing the Christ of the Sun Mysteries.

Behind the scenes of world-history, sublime and wonderful events were taking place.

• From the West came pagan Christianity, the Arthur-Christianity, also under other names and in another form.
• From the East came the Christ in the hearts of men.

And then the meeting takes place — the meeting between the Christ Who had Himself come down to earth and His Own Image which is brought to Him from West to East. This meeting took place in the year 869 A.D. Up to that year we have two streams, clearly distinct from one another.

• The one stream, more in the North, passed across Central Europe and bore the Christ as a Sun Hero, whether the name were Baldur or some other. And under the banner of Christ, the Sun Hero, the Knights of Arthur spread their culture abroad.
• The other stream, rooted inwardly in the hearts of men, which later on became the Grail stream, is to be perceived more in the South, coming from the East. It bears the real Christ, Christ Himself.

The other stream brings to meet it from the West a cosmic Image of the Christ. This meeting of Christ with Himself, of Christ the Brother of Humanity with Christ the Sun Hero Who is there only as it were in an Image — this meeting of Christ with His own Image took place in the 9th century.

Discussion

[1] - Regarding the timings of the "college for destruction of initiation, gnosis, spirit"

References: 1922-07-16-GA213 and 1922-07-23-GA214

This must have taken place in the 4th century. See notes below, and also Schema FMC00.167 above: the 4th century is described as a pivotal point for the 'Loss of Logos' in several lectures.

For references also see wikipedia:

• on the timing of the fall of the western roman empire:

The Fall of the Western Roman Empire was the process in which it failed to enforce its rule. The loss of centralized political control over the West, and the lessened power of the East, are universally agreed, but the theme of decline has been taken to cover a much wider time span than the hundred years from 376 As a convenient marker for the end, 476 has been used since Gibbon, but other key dates for the fall of the Roman Empire in the West include the Crisis of the Third Century, the Crossing of the Rhine in 406 (or 405), the sack of Rome in 410, and the death of Julius Nepos in 480

• see also the chart on the same page on the various invasions of the roman empire, as well as the wikipedia page on the history of the Huns dated from approx 370-470.

Related pages

• Two streams of development
• 869
• Christ Module 6 - Principle in image and story
• Current Postatlantean epoch
• Overlapping evolutionary periods
• The Michaelic stream