Hygienic Occultism

According to Rudolf Steiner, a hygienic occultism will emerge very soon as a result of natural development, especially in the centre of Europe and far into Asia, through which one will learn to prevent illnesses prophylactically by psychic means. In addition to this, a eugenic occultism of spiritual birth control will arise still further east, and a mechanical occultism in the west.

„Of a third faculty, which is latent today and which will develop, I must speak to you. It is the one I want to call the hygienic occult faculty. Now we have all three: the material occult faculty, the eugenetic occult faculty and the hygienic occult faculty. This hygienic occult faculty is well on the way and will relatively not be long in coming. This faculty will mature simply through the insight that human life, in running from birth to death, runs according to a process which is quite identical with a disease process. For disease processes are only special and radical transformations of the quite ordinary, normal life process which runs between birth and death, only that we carry within us not only the disease-making forces but also the health-giving forces. And these health-giving forces, as every occultist knows, are exactly the same as those which one uses when one acquires occult abilities by transforming these forces into knowledge. The healing power inherent in the human organism, transformed into knowledge, gives occult knowledge.

Every knowledgeable person in the Western circles knows that materialistic medicine will have no basis in the future. For at the moment when the hygienic-occult faculties develop, there will be no need for external material medicine, but there will be the possibility of prophylactically treating, of preventing by psychic means, those diseases which do not arise from karmic causes and are therefore beyond our control. Everything will change in this respect. Today this still seems like a mere fantasy, but it is something that will come very soon.

The only thing is that these three abilities will not come equally to all the people of the Earth. You have already seen the differentiation. This differentiation has, of course, only something to do with the bodies, not with the souls, which always go from race to race and from people to people; but it has a great deal to do with the bodies, this differentiation. From the bodies of the English-speaking population can never come out the ability to develop eugenetic-occult abilities in the future through birth. They will be applied precisely in the West, but they will be applied by dominating Eastern countries and by bringing about marriages between the people of the West and the people of the East; by using what can only be learned from the people of the East.

The people of the central countries are particularly predisposed to the hygienic-occult abilities. And the situation is such that the English-speaking population cannot acquire the hygienic-occult abilities through the birth disposition, but that they can acquire these abilities in the course of time in the development between birth and death. There they can become acquired qualities. And in the population roughly east of the Rhine into Asia they will be present through birth. And again it is the case that the population of the Central countries cannot acquire the eugenetic-occult disposition directly by birth, but can acquire it in the course of life when they go to be taught by the people of the East. This is how these abilities will be distributed. The people of the East will have no ability at all for material occultism; they will only be able to receive it if it is given to them, if it is not kept secret from them. And one can always find the means to keep it secret, especially if the others are so foolish as not to believe in the things said by one who is once able to look into these things approximately. So the people of the East and the people of the Midlands will have to receive material occultism from the West. They will receive the blessings - the products. Hygienic occultism will develop mainly in the Central countries, eugenetic occultism in the Eastern countries. But communication will have to take place between people. This is something that must be included in the social impulses of the future; this is something that makes it necessary for people to realise: In the future they will only be able to live as a whole humanity over the whole Earth. For if the American wanted to live only as an American, he would indeed be able to achieve the highest material effect, but he would condemn himself to never being able to get beyond Earthly development. He would condemn himself, if he did not seek social relations with the East, to be banished as a soul to the Earth region after some incarnation and to haunt only within the Earth region. The Earth would be lifted out of its cosmic context, and all these souls would have to haunt it. The man of the East, on the other hand, if he did not absorb with his eugenetic-occult abilities that which draws down to the Earth, the materialism of the West, would lose the Earth. He would merely be drawn into some psycho-spiritual development, and he would lose Earth-development; the Earth would sink under him, as it were, he would not be able to have the fruits of Earth's evolution.“ (Lit.:GA 186, p. 74ff)

Literature

• Rudolf Steiner: Die soziale Grundforderung unserer Zeit – In geänderter Zeitlage, GA 186 (1990), ISBN 3-7274-1860-5 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Vom Einheitsstaat zum dreigliedrigen sozialen Organismus, GA 334 (1983), ISBN 3-7274-3340-X English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org

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.