Europe: between East and West

What kind of people are they, that stretches all the way to the east, and with whom we have no connection? Of course they are also a head and torso and arms and legs, but the inner world in which they live is really oriental. And Eastern is really something different from Western. And we cannot continue to level and globalize if we do not at the same time also understand that so very different thing which also belongs to our world.Watch video on YouTube

The inner world in which they live is really oriental. Eastern is really something different from Western. And we cannot continue to level and globalize if we do not at the same time also understand that so very different thing which also belongs to our world. Yes, we have another opportunity to record a video and that opportunity doesn't ask if it's easy to say something as well. So I actually always sit here with the feeling that it's not at all that easy to say something meaningful in front of a camera. And when you realize that that more or less meaningful thing, which you then hope it will be, when you realize that it also reaches a lot of people, then it's quite a responsibility to do it well. Anyway, I'm going to make another attempt and at the moment we are in a world situation which is extremely difficult. When I look at the last video I made, I said that humanity is an evolving thing. You as a human being are subject to development not just personally, but as a human being. And the big problem, I believe, with our ability to judge in this day and age is that the differentiating ability is lost. You're not really allowed to differentiate, and when you do, you soon get all kinds of labels put on you, which we also see in politics; you have to more or less uncritically follow what opinion dictates. And in a situation like the one we are in now, it also seems quite easy to agree with each other. There was a column by someone in the newspaper, I don't remember his name, who said, how wonderful it is that we are now in a situation where we all agree with each other. Yes, if you are being dictated what you should think, then of course you all agree with each other. This was also the case before the crisis that is now breaking out; we were also told what we had to think and of course this is still going on, but it was not as intense, so you could still have a different opinion. But at the moment we are in a situation in which that actually can no longer be allowed at all, and yes, when you look at the events, then of course you have to say: the one who is the aggressor is always to blame. In a way, of course, that's true. So we pretty much all agree on that then. But I am arguing for a development of the ability to differentiate. And when you feel the need to do that, that whenever there is something to think about - you feel the need to look at not only the obvious point of view but also other points of view, when you like to do that, when you think it's necessary, then of course you have that now. And then the question is: what do we actually see here? And I don't think I would understand any of it if I had not, well almost forty years studied anthroposophy and meditated too. As you may know, in anthroposophy we find not only a path to spirituality, but we also find there a great many insights with regard to history which the founder of anthroposophy, Rudolf Steiner, has always given the designation of fable convenu. This actually means that in the usual history we do not know at all what really happened there. The facts may well be as they are, in which case it is of course always a question whether that is so, that we know that, but even if we really know the facts, we still do not know the deeper backgrounds. And therein lies a great difficulty, I think, when you try to deal with the situation as it is now with the crisis Ukraine-Russia, that you are actually obliged as a human being to look at both sides. This does not mean that you should immediately be told that you agree with the aggressor, because that is not what this is about at all. It is about us forming correct judgments and opinions about it, and we can't actually do that because we don't have the right information about it and because we are also being led in a certain direction with a great deal of force. I have said, and this is actually, yes almost funny, but with a negative flavor, that all people will become brothers, and I have said this with a great deal of emphasis. And I haven't said it yet, or war breaks out. And then you could say: you see, the human being is not essentially good at all, does not strive for brotherhood at all, but is busy with very different things and it is silly to think that this will ever change. I have also said, humanity is evolving. And when you look at where we live in Europe, there you can say, when you look at that big world map, that Europe is really between east and west. And when you learn about world development, human development from deeper backgrounds, then you learn to understand that the time in which we are living now, that that is really the cultural period for Europe. That in Europe the step of development that is necessary if humanity is to move forward again must be taken. I have also called that consciousness soul. We live in Europe, we live with that in the middle between east and west and we should actually make ourselves wide, but that doesn't happen, we are actually as it were sandwiched between east and west. And that's actually something like the human body where the heart gets squeezed. If you can see the heart as a center of organic functioning, where actually everything that is out of balance is brought into balance, then you can say yes, that is the function of Europe in this cultural period. So Europe should become spacious as the heart of the world. But on the other hand, something completely different is happening, and that is not that Europe is becoming wide, and of course that includes the people, but Europe is being squeezed between east and west. That is the tragedy of our cultural period. And as far as I'm concerned, that being squeezed is related to the fact that we really don't see what the mission of Europe is. There is a written appeal by Rudolf Steiner, which he drafted after the first world war, an appeal to the German people. And also to the world of culture. And in it he says that the big problem is, that after Germany became a confederation, a federal republic, that Germany should actually fill the period with culture. And not only with music, painting, drama and that kind of culture, but also with spiritual culture and then spiritual culture in the context of the middle, which would then be a Christian spiritual culture. He doesn't say all that, but he does say that the big problem is, that in the creation of greater Germany, a spiritual cultural objective was not actually lived, or drafted, but it actually degenerated completely into an economic event. While that is alien to German culture and all the cultural countries associated with it. They can do it very well, but they actually have to develop that ability into something completely different. And we, the Dutch, are the little sister, Antje, as they say, the very small country next door, and we are, yes, of German blood, as the national anthem says, we really have a task in Europe that is connected with the development of a spiritual culture. That's what in our time - and we can say, that should be seen roughly up to the year 3500, so we do have some time left - that should develop. And the fact that it's not seen clearly means that there's a tremendous confusion in the relationships between the different powers. And then when you consider what development will take place after 3500, that is the culture of brotherliness. And for that also an, let me say, area in the world has been chosen and that area which has been chosen for that is the Slavic Russian area. That is the area in the world where pre-eminently brotherhood should be allowed to flourish. Well, you don't see anything of that now, of course, but what is interesting is that, for example, a study has been done of President Putin's speeches, which have been developing over the course of many years, and one has seen in them that more and more a mystical interest and a mystical background is emerging. That doesn't justify anything of course, further, but what is bad is that the conclusion of such a report is then, that we as defining Westerners can't really get anything done with that. That's not our way of thinking and so it's actually of no value. It doesn't say so, but that's what it actually means. And that, of course, is very difficult. If you are a human being, then you have the need to understand as much as possible what is going on in the different cultures. And I also thought that this was a goal of the UN, that in the future there would be understanding among each other for the different points of view that you can take. And when you then look to the East, because that is of course Russia, then we have to say that there is a very different inner disposition than we have here in Europe and in the West. And we cannot just reject it. We should try to have some understanding of that, then maybe you would also understand better what is happening now. Then you could still reject it, because of course violence is really not what can be justified, but you would have a better understanding of where all this is coming from. I had a very peculiar biology teacher when I was at grammar school in Amsterdam, with very strong sympathies and antipathies, which of course is not really appropriate for a teacher, but he had them, and I fell among the students he had sympathy for, and that led to him giving me a book as a present at one point, a very old book, bound in leather, printed in Gothic letters, almost impossible for a modern person to read, in German by a Russian writer, Gogol, and that book was called, it still is called, Die toten Seelen. I took that book home with me, of course, and because it was a gift from a teacher I felt, yes, obligated is perhaps too strong, but compelled to read it. And then of course it was very difficult because it was in that Gothic script and then also in German, but anyway I did it and what I got out of it - I couldn't possibly say anymore what it's about - what I mainly got out of it is that people are described who are so totally different from us down-to-earth Dutch, Europeans, I think also English and Americans, but I'm not sure, so totally different that you can almost say: Yes, that is just like what I said last time, when you would go back to Greece, you would meet people there who are totally different from us. And we are limited in our view. We think that the way we are, that's the only thing that's right, and that they're just weird people described there. Yes weird, unusual at least. And that's something that has stayed with me. Later I also read Dostoevsky and Tolstoy and much later Soloviev. And there it's different, there it's less extreme, but something of those sensations I had with that book in my adolescence, I should say, can also be found there. And you should, I think, actually read some Russian literature now. Not to approve of what's happening there, because that's not what it's about, but to get to know the right proportions and to learn: what kind of people are they, that stretches all the way to the east, and with whom we have no connection. Of course they are also a head and torso and arms and legs, but the inner world in which they live is really oriental. And Eastern is really something different from Western. And we cannot continue to level and globalize if we do not at the same time also understand that so very different thing which also belongs to our world and which, when you get to know the spiritual backgrounds of world development, is even a, yes as it were now a root, for what must come to fruition in a next cultural period and that will be the brotherliness between people.