” If you don’t want to do the Apocalypse, it’s better not to want to understand. “
It’s all about understanding the Apocalypse as a task that’s close to our hearts every day. Nowadays there is no point in simply interpreting the Apocalypse. It is necessary that we do the Apocalypse in everything, otherwise we can (want to) understand it better.
Rudolf Steiner, 9 September 1924 (Dornach: GA 346, p.85)
” The Apocalypse shows how, after the arrival of Christ, the earth’s evolution continues.”
The Apocalypse reveals the separate facts that must take place so that Christian development from the mystery of Calvary [in which Christ entered into the earth evolution] continues through time and eternity. From now on, man can communicate with the spirit not only through nature (the Father) but also through the Christ (the Son).
Rudolf Steiner, 13 September 1924 (Dornach: GA 346, p. 126, p. 132),
” The Apocalypse shows esoteric Christianity ”
The Apocalypse was originally given to the priests as the actual esoteric Christianity alongside the other that was exoteric.
Rudolf Steiner, 19 September 1924 (Dornach: GA 346, p.219)
” Every human being will experience the contents of the Apocalypse in the future. ”
The assessment of the fate of mankind is the content of the Apocalypse, which every human being will experience when he reaches the stage of inspiration in the future.
Valentin Tomberg, The Karmic Consequences of the Mystery of Golgotha, in: (Ed. C. Barker, translation I. Corner) The Four Sacrifices of Christ and His Return to the Etheric World, Lectures held 13-20 August 1939 in Rotterdam, Assen: Nearchus, p. 84)
” We have to orient the outer facts entirely towards the spiritual backgrounds. ”
Those who want to participate in the spiritual life and work towards the spiritual life must orient the outer facts of the historical development entirely towards the spiritual backgrounds [as shown by the Apocalypse].
Rudolf Steiner, 11 September 1924 (Dornach: GA 346, p.101)
” Every moment can be found from about seven how things are going. ”
One can actually start at any moment and then find out how things are going from the principle of seven… One cannot find the coherence in the world evolution if one does not apply the principle of number as a method of reflection [as the author of the Apocalypse has done]. The numbers work at the moment that the spiritual world breaks through and manifests itself, but they should not be related to the human individual or to events in the spiritual world.
Rudolf Steiner, 17 September 1924 (Dornach: GA 346, p.193-195)
” Whoever sees every evil as a result of human action will not be able to understand the Revelation. ”
One of the central messages of this book is that there is a power of evil that is independent of man’s behaviour and that cannot be overcome by man… This view runs counter to our contemporary confidence in man’s abilities and our belief that every evil is a consequence of human action. Those who accept this contemporary belief will not be able to understand Revelation… Moreover, we cannot play a role in the divine struggle against evil as long as we do not believe in the existence of evil.
Daniel van Egmond, Syllabus seminars 1994-1995 on Revelation, p. 11-12 (http://www.nachtwind.nl/daniel-van-egmond.html).
” Through Revelation we look at our culture from the point of view of the heavens. ”
As we try to understand the Revelation of John, we learn to see our culture from the point of view of the heavens.
Daniel van Egmond, Report of the Kabbalah and Western spirituality seminar on Revelation, 6 September 1994, p. 11 (http://www.nachtwind.nl/daniel-van-egmond.html).
” The Revelation as a handbook for the way back ”
Whoever reads Revelation and tries to find out what the different judgments mean and what it tells me how I can live, then Revelation will not only play a visionary role, but it will also become a kind of handbook. A handbook for the way back: what can you pay attention to, what can you take care of? Also a manual for the processes after death… Revelation gives a visual language that belongs to the soul…and that helps to go away (back)…Revelation is meant to work with it.
Daniël van Egmond, Report of the seminar Kabbala and Western spirituality on Revelation, 4 April 1995, p. 18-19 (http://www.nachtwind.nl/daniel-van-egmond.html).
” Literally interpreting the text of the Revelation is wrong ”
Revelation has been misinterpreted in the sense that they were going to take the text literally and say it, look what it says that is a historical process… But then you don’t realize that it is a sacred scripture. It’s not about that… Yet everything that is told in Revelation appears in space and time, not at one moment as it is described, but at the same time… And when you discover a key yourself, something is going to change in you.
Daniel van Egmond, Report of the Kabbalah and Western spirituality seminar on Revelation, June 1995, p. 9 (http://www.nachtwind.nl/daniel-van-egmond.html).
” Full understanding of the Apocalypse requires insight into Egyptian mystery wisdom ”
The John Apocalypse is only fully understandable in the light of Egyptian mystery wisdom. The Jewish temple, like the Egyptian temple, was divided into court, sanctuary and holiest, which microcosmically referred to the trinity of body, soul and spirit and macrocosmically to the trinity of earth, cosmos and the supercosmic world of the gods………Johannes therefore places the initiation path of his Apocalypse in the sign of a passage through the temple. The seals correspond to the court, the trumpets to the sanctuary and the wrath scales of divine willpower with the holiest of holies.
Arthur Schult, 1976, Welten Werden und Johannesapokalypse, Bietigheim-Wurttemberg: Turm Verlag, p. 363-364.