37. Symbolism In Human Fate

 
If people did not completely absorbed themselves in the necessities and the many trivialities of everyday life, but instead wanted to pay a little attention to observing the great and small happenings in their surroundings a little more attentively, then they would soon come to a new realization. They would be amazed at themselves and find it hard to believe that they could previously pass over such striking things so thoughtlessly. And they would also have every reason to shake their heads pityingly at themselves. With just a few observation, a whole world of strictly ordered, living processes suddenly opens up to them, clearly revealing a firm guidance from a higher Hand: The world of symbolism!
 
This is rooted deeply in the ethereal part of Creation, where only the outermost ends reach down visibly into the earthly as offshoots. It is like a sea that seems to be completely at rest, whose constant movements are not visible, but can only be observed in their last offshoots on the shore. Man has not the slightest idea that, with a little effort and attention, he can clearly observe the workings of karma, which are so decisive and so dreaded by him. It is possible for him to become more familiar with it, whereby little by little the fear that often arises in thinking people falls away in time and karma loses its terrors. For many, it can become a path to ascent, when they learn to feel the deeper waves of ethereal life, through earthly visible events and can follow them, through which, in time, the conviction of the existence of absolutely consistent reciprocal effects arise. But once a person has come to this conclusion, he slowly follows it step by step, until finally he recognizes the strictly logical and unbroken driving force of the conscious Divine Will in the whole of Creation, that is, in the material and ethereal worlds. From that moment on, he will take it into account and voluntarily submit to it. But this means for him a swimming in the Force, the effects of which can thus only be beneficial for him. It serves him because he knows how to use it, by fitting in, by adjusting himself correctly. In this way, the reciprocal effect can only bring him good luck. Smiling, he then sees every biblical word literally fulfilled, which, because of its childlike simplicity, sometimes wanted to become a stumbling block to him, and which often threatened to become difficult for him to fulfil because, according to his previous opinion, it required a sense of servitude. The command to obey, which he found unpleasant, gradually becomes, before his eyes that have become enlightened, the highest honour that can be bestowed on a creature; a truly Divine Gift that carries within it the possibility of a tremendous spiritual development of strength, which makes possible a personally conscious participation in the magnificent Creation. The expressions: “Only he who humbles himself will be exalted”, man must "humbly bow before his God” in order to be able to enter His Kingdom, he should “obey”, ”serve”, and what is more of the biblical advice, they repel modern man somewhat from the outset in this simple, childlike and yet so apt manner of expressing himself, because they wound his pride, which lies in the consciousness of intellectual knowledge. He no longer wants to be led so blindly, but to consciously participate in everything, in order to receive the inner impetus necessary for everything great out of conviction. And that is not wrong!
 
Man should stand more consciously of his further evolution in Creation than he was before. And when he will have joyfully recognized that the simple biblical expressions, in their form so foreign to the present time, advise exactly everything that he, knowing the mighty Laws of Nature, also decides to do voluntarily and with full conviction, it falls from his eyes like a blindfold. He stands shaken before the fact that he has so far only rejected the old teachings because he had interpreted them wrongly, and that he never seriously tried to penetrate them properly, to reconcile them with the present understanding.

Whether it is said: “In humility bow to the Will of God”, or “after correct recognition of the mighty Laws of Nature make use of their nature and their effects”, is one and the same.
 
Man can only make use of the forces that carry God’s Will if he studies them in detail, that is, recognizes them, and then acts accordingly. Taking them into account or acting in accordance with them is in reality nothing more than to adapting oneself to them, therefore bowing down! Do not stand against these forces, but go with them. Only by adapting one’s will to the nature of the forces, that is, by going in the same direction with them, can man harness the power of the forces. This is not a conquering of the forces, but humble bowing before the Divine Will! Even if man calls some things cleverness or the acquisition of knowledge, it does not change the fact that everything only means a so-called “finding” of the effects of existing Natural Laws, therefore of the Divine Will, which one has thus “recognized”, and with the evaluation or use “submit” to this Will. This is absolutely a humble bowing before the Will of God, an “obeying”!
 
But now to the symbolism! Every event in Creation, that is, in the World of Matter, must come to a correct conclusion in its cycle, or, as one can also say: it must close like a ring. Therefore, according to the Laws of Creation, everything must return to its starting point, where alone it can find its end, that is, dissolved, disintegrated, or extinguished as a working force. This applies to the whole of Creation itself, as well as to every single event. From this arises the absolute law of return, which in turn brings out the symbolism.
 
Since all actions must end where they originated, it follows that every action must also end in the same kind of matter in which it originated. Therefore, an ethereal beginning must have an ethereal end, but a gross beginning must have a gross end. Humans cannot see the Ethereal World, but they call the gross material end of every event symbolic. It is certainly visible to them, but many lack the actual key to it, the beginning, which in most cases lies in a previous gross material existence.
 
Even if the greatest part of all the events of reciprocal actions only takes place in the Ethereal World, the karma thus working in this way could never find a full redemption if the end did not in some way play into the Gross Material World and becomes visible there. Only through a visible process, which corresponds to the sense of reciprocal action, can a running ring be closed, whereby complete redemption occurs, regardless of whether this is good or evil, happiness or unhappiness, blessing or forgiveness, according to the nature of the former beginning. This final visible effect must come at the same place where the origin lies, that is, with the person who once gave the beginning to it by some action. It cannot be avoided under any circumstances.
 
If, in the meantime, the person concerned has changed inwardly in such a way that something better has come to life in him than was the former action, then the reciprocal action cannot gain a firm foothold in its kind. It no longer finds a similar soil in the upward striving soul, which, according to the Law of Spiritual Gravityhas become more luminous and thus lighter. The natural consequence is that a darker effect is interspersed by the luminous environment of the person concerned as it approaches and thus considerably weakened. But still the Law of Revolution and Reciprocal Action must be fully complied with in their automatically acting force. It is impossible to abolish any Law of Nature.
 
Consequently, such a weakened reciprocal action must, in accordance with the immutable Laws, also have a visible gross material effect in order to be truly redeemed, and therefore extinguished. The end must flow back into the beginning. Because of the luminous environment, however, dark karma cannot bring harm to the person concerned, and so it happens that this weakened reciprocal action only affects the immediate environment in such a way that the person concerned comes into the position to do something voluntary, the nature of which only corresponds to the sense of the returning reciprocal action. The difference between this and the actual unbroken force of the effect of the returning dark current destined for him, is that it does not cause him any pain or harm, but perhaps even gives him joy.
 
This is then a purely symbolic release of some heavy karma, but completely in accordance with the Laws of Creation, and working automatically in this way through the change in the state of the soul. That is why most people often remain completely unconscious of it. Karma is thus dissolved, the unalterable Justice is satisfied down to the most delicate currents. In these processes, which are self-evident according to the Laws of Creation, lie such mighty Acts of Grace as only the All-Wisdom of the Creator in His perfect Work could bring about.
 
There are many such purely symbolic releases of reciprocal actions that would otherwise be difficult to grasp!
 
Let us take an example: A person who was once of a rigid, domineering character, in the exercise of these qualities, had gravely oppressed his fellow human beings, incurring upon himself a heavy karma, which, with its own unique character, passes through the cycle and must then falls back upon him in the same way, often intensified. As it approaches, this current of ruthless lust for power, often enormously intensified by the Law of Attraction of ethereal homogeneity, will so permeate the entire ethereal environment of the person concerned that it will have a decisive effect on the denser material environment closely connected with it, and thereby create conditions which will force the former originator to suffer from the same imperiousness to a far greater extent than the fellow human beings whom he had formerly tormented.
 
If, however, such a person has in the meantime already come to better understanding and has gained a luminous and lighter environment through honest efforts to ascend, then naturally the nature of the final effect also changes with it. The returning denser darkness will be more or less penetrated by this light, according to the intensity of the luminosity of the new surroundings of the person concerned, and consequently also rendered more or less harmless. If the person who used to be so tyrannical has risen to great heights, that is, in the case of an extraordinary improvement of this guilty person, it may now happen that the actual effect is as good as cancelled and he only temporarily does something which outwardly resembles an atonement. Let us suppose the person in question is a woman. It would be enough for her to take the brush out of a maid’s hand once to show her how the scrub the floor in a friendly manner. Even if it is only a few gestures of this kind, the symbolism of the most menial service is thereby satisfied. This brief action gives a release which had to happen visibly and which, despite its easiness, is capable of ending a heavy karma.
 
Likewise, the rearranging of furniture in a single room may become the symbol for the termination and annulment of a debt, the atonement or reciprocal action of which would actually have required a greater, painfully drastic upheaval. These things result in some way from the weakened influences of a reciprocal action, or random actions are also sometimes used by the spiritual guidance to bring about a redemption through them.
 
The prerequisite for all these is, of course, that an unusually extraordinary upsurge and the associated change in the state of the soul connected with it have already occurred. Circumstances which, of course, an astrologer is naturally unable to take into consideration, and as a result of this, his calculations often causes unnecessary worry, sometimes even such fear, which in itself has the power to evoke or create something unpleasant, so that a calculation is fulfilled even if only seemingly, which would otherwise have proved to be wrong if it had not been for this fear. In such cases, however, the person concerned has opened a door in the surrounding circle of light through his fear. Where he voluntarily reaches out hand through the protective covering, he cannot be helped from any side. His own will breaches every protection from the inside out, while from the outside, without his own will, nothing is able to approach him through the luminous surrounding.
 
Thus the smallest kindness towards one’s fellow human beings, a truly felt suffering of one’s neighbour, a single kind word, can now be transformed into the symbolic redemption of a karma, as soon as inwardly the earnest volition for good has been laid as a foundation.
 
This must, of course, precede it; otherwise there can be no question of a symbolic redemption, because then everything that flows back will then have its full effect in every respect. But as soon as the earnest volition to ascend really sets in a human being, he can very soon observe how little by little more and more life comes into his surroundings, as if all kinds of things were put in his path, but which always end well. It even notices it. Ultimately, however, there comes a period in which more calm sets in, or everything that happens is clearly recognizable as serving to uplift the soul. Then the time of redemption is over. With joyful gratitude he can devote himself to the thought that much guilt has been released from him, which otherwise he would have had to atone for heavily. Then he should be on his guard that all the threads of fate that he reweaves through his willing and wishing are only good, so that only good things can come back to him!