GERMAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCES |
SCIENTIFICALLY INTRODUCING UNIVERSALITY TO THE UNIVERSITY |
PART XII | 115 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
THE PROCESS OF CREATING MUSIC | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The Legacy of Our Ancestors |
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By the inner logic of our ancestors’ language by its technology we find confirmation of what has been said in this book about music and also about speech, and we begin to understand why our ancestors, in their records, have so seriously urged us never to lose sight of our free, inner formative will amidst the outer turbulence of time, and to forever place the highest value on an integrated personality. |
Confirmation of New Insights in Music |
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To pass on their knowledge, our forefathers thus chose, for example, the symbol of the forge. In this respect, the art of the smith was the symbol for that inner ability of shaping speech, for that true skill of poetry, which was considered a prerequisite for mastering the inner and the outer world. |
Our Ancestors as Masters over the Power-Promising Creativity |
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Everyone had to master this inner art and equipped with the keenness of his understanding forge for himself the sword of his action, namely the intellect: under the guidance of a master in the high art of smithery who also knew how to teach it: a master over the field of power-promising creativity: over the true art of war on the battlefield of life. |
Master over the High Art of Warfare on the Battlefield of Life |
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Such a personality is described by our forefathers as being equipped with a golden helmet, a golden breast plate, and a golden sword the helmet symbolizing sovereignty over the understanding, the breast plate sovereignty over the feeling, and the sword representing the creative power of self-cognition. The golden shield was the sign of the sun, the symbol for the self of the acting individual, which from the level of self-awareness radiates its light of pure knowledge into the field of the mind, and from there into the surrounding world. |
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We have used this one example only to present, in principle, our forefathers’ lively, symbolic yet universally understandable, timeless way of description and to show how deep an inspiration we can draw today from their ancient records. |
The Timeless Method of Description of Our Forefathers |
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Every day we all make use of language but we use it only on the level of simple categorical meanings. And yet we desire to comprehend our language as a live expression of our ancestor’s true art of poetry. |
The Desire for Music of Our Generation |
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When, in the normal waking state of consciousness, someone says the word “tree,” the listener knows what is meant, but he has not the lively impression, the vivid image of that very specific tree as though he would actually experience it. |
Lack of Sensitivity in the Language of Today |
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This lack of inner imagination in the waking state of consciousness results from our inner bondage to the outer sensory perception which, for example, is considerably reduced in the dreaming state of consciousness and therefore substantially diminished in its binding influence, an influence which, in the waking state, diverts us towards the outside, away from the powerful inner imagination. |
Weak Inner Imagination in the Uncultivated Waking State of Consciousness |
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This gives us an idea of the great loss that is incurred when handling the elements of language in a routine, mechanistic, and undifferentiated manner which is drummed into the heads even in school, and which drives the feeling towards linguistic stagnation. And the very same word that gives rise to a vivid experience in the dreaming state of consciousness, appears merely as a shadow on the level of the common waking state, and is unable to sufficiently stimulate the inner fantasy. |
Loss of the Perfect Use of Speech |
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