World Memory

At the beginning of the chapter *Reincarnation and Karma* in the book ‘Theosophy’ by Rudolf Steiner, he posed for us the question whether it could not be that the great world also has a capacity for memory, just as we also have it in the small. When we perceive something or experience something, all the events of life, they imprint themselves on memory, and we are able, within certain limits, we are able to form these representations anew from memory. And Rudolf Steiner then poses the question whether the world does not also have a memory and that this world remembers what we have done to the world, whether that is positive or negative, everything we do to the world might perhaps be remembered by the world. That is, of course, immediately nonsense if one looks at the world only materially, then that is not possible at all. Such a question applies only to people who have the sense for occupying themselves with the soul-spiritual of the world. So, the question is put to us. And now, at the end of the chapter, this question returns. While reading the chapter, one often has the feeling: will this question still come to an answer?

The Pied Piper

Now, the last time I spoke about a first scenario and read a piece from a lecture by Rudolf Steiner, in which he emphasized that when people follow the outer events purely outwardly and also combine them outwardly with the intellect, there will be no end to the chaos and the wars in the world. And that it is necessary that humanity, we, come so far that we develop a skill not only to remain standing at that which the senses and the intellect have to offer us, but that we develop a capacity to become aware of the spiritual therein. Well, that is of course something – I assume that most people who watch these videos, listen, have already accepted the spiritual aspect, that there exists not a belief, but a knowledge that you live in a world and that as a human being you are a human being who is not as the senses and the intellect alone show, but that there is a spiritual reality that reveals itself in it.

The Talents as Testimony of Individuality

In the previous video I tried, on the basis of Rudolf Steiner’s Theosophy, to indicate how the soul, as the middle member between body and spirit, descends downward, to the body, as the sentient soul permeates, penetrates the astral body, and how from above the spiritual, in the form of the spirit-self, radiates through the consciousness soul with the true and the good, and the beautiful is then a consequence. Rudolf Steiner then continues the train of thought, and of course one question remains: when we stand in life in this way, and we have our own being-human and we also have the being-human of others — how then do we distinguish between certain dispositions that someone has, which come from hereditary disposition, and the purely spiritual dispositions? And in the next section of the text Rudolf Steiner elaborates on this.

A First Scenario

Thoughts have no power, I said last time. And I tried to nuance that by saying that they can have power. And I really like that there are such nuanced responses to that, not only on YouTube, but also in the form of emails, that gives the courage to continue with this theme. One of the questions was: Isn’t there a text we could do or read together, through which we could jointly move toward a positive scenario, not a war scenario, but a positive world scenario. And I immediately know which quote from the work of Rudolf Steiner I would like to take for that. And so I took it. I will read it aloud in a moment. But before that I want to say something else, which is of course related to it. And that is that it would be important for us as human beings to reflect much more on the, let me say, spiritual part in us. We differ from the animal.

The Soul

It seems that I have to explain every time why I, as a Dutch woman, speak German. Yes, of course I can’t do that every time. And I know all too well that I am a Dutch woman who tries to speak German. But I continue doing it this way, because I have many German-speaking friends who, over the course of years, have more or less walked the path with me. And when I really speak about anthroposophy, as I do in these videos, then I speak German. And my German, of course, is not completely bad either. We continue with the explanations of Rudolf Steiner in his book Theosophy about reincarnation and karma.

Thoughts Have No Power

Last time, I made a case for the idea that thoughts have power. And today I would like to contradict that. I believe it’s generally healthy to contradict oneself regularly, but this time it is also necessary. I’m also responding to several reactions I received, including via email, which I always find very interesting and which truly help to shape the subject further. So I thank everyone sincerely for the responses that keep coming in – I always read them.
Thoughts have no power. Thoughts are reflections of something that once was real, but now more or less dissolve into an illusory reflection.

The Importance of Repetition

We follow the chapter “Reincarnation and Karma” in the book Theosophy by Rudolf Steiner, in order to get an impression of how one can, with thinking alone, obtain a very great certainty about this phenomenon of reincarnation and karma. First, Rudolf Steiner had posed the question whether it could perhaps be that, just as we have a memory within ourselves, the world too has a memory — a memory for the deeds we perform upon it.

Do Thoughts have Power?

The question is: Do thoughts have power? Of course, we try to think along with world events. And the question is whether that also changes anything in world affairs when we do so. I believe that when you think along with ordinary, more associative thinking, it doesn’t have much effect. Everyday thoughts—you can sort of just pass right through them—they have little to no power. At least, no power that means anything in world events. But on the other hand, it is known—and this is known even in not particularly spiritual circles—that when you really want something with your thoughts, it does generate a force that helps make what you want happen.

The ancestors of the person

Let us continue with karma and reincarnation as Rudolf Steiner made it understandable for us in his book Theosophy.What is special about it is that he always tried to make clear that the spiritual can really be followed by thinking, that one can understand it, that one does not need to be clairvoyant for it, but that – as he sometimes calls it – the healthy human intellect is there for that purpose and is spiritually sufficient to understand a spiritual science that has been perceived by a clairvoyant. And he actually gives, in the book Theosophy, and as an example in the chapter on reincarnation and karma – there he bears witness to the fact that it is so. What one actually notices, if one reads very concentratedly and precisely what he has written, then one notices that thinking shifts to another level. Although it remains intellectual thinking, it quietly becomes something else. And if this shift does not take place – yes, then one reads in such a way – then one can, as they say, read diagonally – like: one, two, three, hop – then one reads it superficially, and that which Rudolf Steiner writes is not to be taken as proof of the reality of reincarnation and karma. But if one takes part in this slight shift, then in the course of the text it becomes clear – it really seems to shine through – this spiritual reality; it becomes clear that here, through these words, through these concepts, through this sequence of thoughts, it is proven that the human being is a reincarnating being. And in the previous two videos on this topic, I first described the beginning – that Rudolf Steiner poses as a kind of question: whether it might not be possible that the world, too, has a memory. That not only human beings are the ones who can remember all sorts of things, but that also the world, which we change through our actions, that this world has a memory. And that at some point the facts will reappear and must be balanced out. That is a question – he does not immediately answer it with “yes,” but it is a wonderful idea. And one feels, if one reads it in the way I meant, then one feels that one enters another mode of thinking when one wants to regard such a question as a possibility. For then one no longer has only that which is known to us – our own memory capacity – but one imagines that in the world, which is for us more or less spiritless, soulless, that in this world there could be something like something soulful, something spiritual, that could remember our deeds.

Democracy

In recent weeks we have experienced the fall of the cabinet in the Netherlands. I have said before, I cannot connect myself to a party. That just doesn’t work, because I see something in all parties, but I also see a lot in all parties with which I totally disagree. So you might almost say: start your own party, but that is completely out of the question. But what then at least very clearly stands out is the use of the word democracy. And I must say that it has increasingly started to irritate me how that word is used, with what kind of conduct and a certain way of being very sure that precisely that party which is speaking, knows what the true democracy is.