Mystery of Golgotha

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Crucifixion, Michelangelo 1540

The Mystery of Golgotha, which took place with the crucifixion, the death on the cross, the burial, the descent into hell and the resurrection of Christ, is the central event of the entire development of the Earth and of humanity. With it, the actual birth of the human I took place.

„Without the Mystery of Golgotha, sibylism, which is connected with the elementary forces of the Earth, which work in the subconscious of the soul and push themselves out in a passionate way, would have triumphed over the conscious I-forces, would have pushed back the I-forces. The I would have been lost to the development of humanity. As a force we see the Christ-impulse working in the course of humanity, even without human consciousness having taken it up.“ (Lit.:GA 152, p. 97)

The crucifixion of Christ on 3 April 33

→ Main article: Crucifixion

Rudolf Steiner's spiritual research confirms that the death of Christ on the cross actually took place on Friday, April 3, 33, at the ninth hour, that is, at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, according to the Julian calendar:

„On a Friday, the 3rd of April of the year 33, three o'clock in the afternoon, the Mystery of Golgotha took place. And there also took place the birth of the I in the sense in which we have often characterised it. And it is quite indifferent on which point of the Earth the human being lives, or to which religious confession he belongs, that which came into the world through the Mystery of Golgotha applies to all human beings. Just as it is true for all the world that Caesar died on a certain day, and not another day for the Chinese and yet another day for the Indians, so it is a simple fact of occult life that the Mystery of Golgotha took place on that day and that one has to do there with the birth of the I. This is a fact of a quite international kind. This is a fact of a quite international kind.“ (Lit.:GA 143, p. 163)

The Mystery of Golgotha as a mystical fact

The Three Crosses, etching by Rembrandt van Rijn, 1683

The actual significance of the Mystery of Golgotha lies not in the external events but in their spiritual backgrounds. It must be grasped as a supersensible mystical fact. Rudolf Steiner already pointed this out in his fundamental writing "Christianity as Mystical Fact and the Mysteries of Antiquity".

„Only when we have the ideas, the concepts, which lead into the supersensible, can we also understand the Mystery of Golgotha, which is precisely an event that has to do with the supersensible, not with the sensuous world. What took place in the sensuous world of the Mystery of Golgotha is only the outer reflection.“ (Lit.:GA 198, p. 243)

Through death on Golgotha, the Christ united himself with the Earth and thereby gave it its meaning.

„Just as life is inaccessible to human knowledge, so is this the case with death towards the true knowledge which is attained in the supersensible worlds. In the whole realm of the supersensible worlds there is no death. One can only die on earth, in the physical world or in the worlds which resemble our Earth in their development, and all the beings who are hierarchically higher than man have no knowledge of death, they only know different states of consciousness. Their consciousness can temporarily be so lowered that it is similar to our earthly state of sleep, but it can wake up again from this sleep. There is no death in the spiritual world, there are only changes of consciousness there, and the greatest fear that man has, the fear of death, cannot be felt by one who has ascended to the supersensible worlds after death. There is therefore no death for beings belonging to the higher Hierarchies, with only one exception, that of the Christ. But in order that a supersensible being like the Christ might pass through death, he had first to descend to Earth. And this is what is of such immeasurable importance in the Mystery of Golgotha, that a being which in its own realm could never have experienced death in the sphere of its will, had to descend to Earth in order to undergo an experience peculiar to man, namely, to experience death. A being, unique in its kind, which until then had only been cosmic, united itself with earth evolution through the Mystery of Golgotha, through the death of the Christ. Since then it has lived on Earth in such a way, is so bound to Earth, that it lives in the souls of men on Earth and experiences life on Earth with them. Therefore, the whole time before the Mystery of Golgotha was only a time of preparation in the evolution of the earth. The Mystery of Golgotha gave the Earth its meaning. When the Mystery of Golgotha took place, the earthly body of Jesus of Nazareth was given over to the elements of the Earth, and from that time the Christ was connected with the spiritual sphere of the Earth and lives in it.“ (Lit.:GA 152, p. 39f)

Overcoming the consequences of the Fall

Only through the act of Christ could the consequences of the Fall for man and for the whole Earth be overcome:

„It is, then, what has happened through the Mystery of Golgotha, a gods' matter by which a compensation has been made for a matter of Lucifer. It is the only divine affair that has taken place before the eyes of men.“ (Lit.:GA 143, p. 191)

The Mystery of Golgotha, as a mystical fact, has happened for all men, whether they know of the Christ or consciously confess Him.

„A time will come when he who is a follower of the Chinese, the Buddhist, the Brahmanical religion, will find it as much against his religion to accept the Mystery of Golgotha as he finds it against his religion to accept the Copernican World System. And it will be regarded as a kind of religious egoism if the non-Christian religions refuse to accept this fact. The fact which has just now been asserted by the Mystery of Golgotha has nothing to do with any denominational Christ, but is an objective occult fact. Just as no one can forbid the teaching of the Copernican worldview because it is not contained in the ancient Indian religious books, so no one can forbid the teaching of the fact of the Mystery of Golgotha for the reason that it is not contained in the religious books of the ancient Indians.“ (Lit.:GA 140, p. 22f)

However, the fact that the Mystery of Golgotha has happened and has left its effects does not yet secure the future of humanity. In the future, more and more will depend on people placing themselves in a completely individual conscious relationship with the Christ, completely independent of any confession of faith. What the Christ is able to give by grace only becomes effective in its full power when people prepare themselves to receive his gift.

„Just as in the region of the human heart there is a continual transformation of blood into etheric substance, so a similar process takes place in the macrocosm. We understand this when we turn our eye to the Mystery of Golgotha and to that moment when the blood of the Christ Jesus flowed from the wounds. This blood must not be regarded merely as a chemical substance, but by all that has been described as the nature of Jesus of Nazareth, it is something very special. And in that it flowed out and flowed into the Earth, a substance was given to our Earth which, in uniting itself with the Earth, was an event that is a most significant one for all subsequent times of the Earth, and which could also only occur once. What happened to this blood in the following times? Nothing different from what usually happens in the human heart. In the course of earth evolution, this blood underwent a process of etherisation. And just as our blood flows upwards from the heart as ether, so the etherised blood of the Christ Jesus has lived in the earth ether since the Mystery of Golgotha. The etheric body of the Earth is permeated by what has become of the blood that flowed on Golgotha; and that is important. If that had not happened, which happened through the Christ Jesus, then only that would be the case with the people on Earth which has been described before. Since the Mystery of Golgotha, however, there has been a continual possibility of the etheric blood of the Christ flowing in these currents from below to above.

Because the etheric blood of Jesus of Nazareth is in the Earth's etheric body, the etheric blood of this Jesus of Nazareth flows with the etheric blood of man, which flows from below upwards, from the heart to the brain, so that not only does what has been described above come together in man, but the actual human blood current and the blood current of the Christ Jesus come together. But a connection between these two currents can only come about if the human being has the right understanding of what is contained in the Christ-impulse. Otherwise no connection can come about, otherwise the two currents will repel each other, colliding just as they have collided. We can only acquire understanding if in each age of earthly development we acquire this understanding in the way it is adapted to that age. At the time when the Christ Jesus lived on Earth, those who came to his forerunner John and were baptised by the formula expressed in the Gospel were able to understand the forthcoming fact. They received baptism in order to change the sin, that is, the karma of their previous lives, which had come to an end, and in order to recognise that the most important impulse of earthly evolution would now descend into a physical body. But the evolution of humanity is progressing, and for our present time it is important that man should learn to realise that he must receive spiritual-scientific knowledge and gradually so fire that which flows from the heart to the brain that it will meet Anthroposophy with understanding. The result will be that he will be able to receive that which begins to intervene from the twentieth century onwards: that is, opposite the physical Christ of Palestine, the etheric Christ.

For we have reached that point in time when the etheric Christ intervenes in earthly life and first becomes visible to a small number of people as in a natural clairvoyance. Then in the next three thousand years he will become visible to more and more people. That must come, that is a natural event.“ (Lit.:GA 130, p. 92f)

Literatur
References to the work of Rudolf Steiner follow Rudolf Steiner's Collected Works (CW or GA), Rudolf Steiner Verlag, Dornach/Switzerland, unless otherwise stated.
Email: verlag@steinerverlag.com URL: www.steinerverlag.com.
Index to the Complete Works of Rudolf Steiner - Aelzina Books
A complete list by Volume Number and a full list of known English translations you may also find at Rudolf Steiner's Collected Works
Rudolf Steiner Archive - The largest online collection of Rudolf Steiner's books, lectures and articles in English.
Rudolf Steiner Audio - Recorded and Read by Dale Brunsvold
steinerbooks.org - Anthroposophic Press Inc. (USA)
Rudolf Steiner Handbook - Christian Karl's proven standard work for orientation in Rudolf Steiner's Collected Works for free download as PDF.
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