{"id":63729,"date":"2025-02-26T13:33:02","date_gmt":"2025-02-26T12:33:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/?p=63729"},"modified":"2025-02-26T19:32:56","modified_gmt":"2025-02-26T18:32:56","slug":"matter-isnt-made-of-matter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/matter-isnt-made-of-matter\/","title":{"rendered":"Matter Isn\u2019t Made of Matter"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Chemist Martin Rozumek and biologist Hans-Christian Zehnter have written separately on the subject of how the world can be understood without an atomistic conception of matter. They see earthly reality as an appearance specifically intended for us human beings. This has methodological and existential consequences for our relation to the world. They decided to write a joint essay for Das Goetheanum <\/em>to accompany the publication of their recent articles in Merkurstab<\/em> (Martin Rozumek)<\/strong><\/span>1<\/sup><\/a><\/span> and Archivmagazin<\/em> (Hans-Christian Zehnter)<\/strong><\/span>2<\/sup><\/a><\/span>.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

The starting point for our considerations is Rudolf Steiner\u2019s mantra-like statement in his introductions to Goethe\u2019s scientific writings: the sensory image of the world is a sum of metamorphosing perceptual content, without any underlying matter.<\/span>3<\/sup><\/a><\/span> But, this does not apply to the \u201cmatter as a phenomenon, as an appearance\u201d that seems to fill space,<\/span>4<\/sup><\/a><\/span> which gives rise to the belief that the world is perceived as an appearance for the human senses and the human mind:<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

\u201cIf we begin with mental pictures of atoms, we become stuck in a materialism that ultimately leads to destruction. We can only cope with the world of perceptions when we understand it as phenomena, as a world of appearances. What we encounter through the senses is not matter at all. So, we must develop a feeling .\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0when we look through our eyes and see the starry sky, see the formations of the clouds, see the inhabitant of the three kingdoms\u2014the mineral, plant, and animal\u2014and also of the fourth kingdom of human beings, we must not look for matter in all that we find approaching us through our perceptions. There is no matter there! These are all appearances, all phenomena, akin to the rainbow, for example, even though they appear much more substantial. [The human being should] perceive that which meets him through the senses as phenomena, as appearance, however substantial it may be. Even with the quartz crystal, even when we can grasp it with our hand (of course, with the rainbow, we\u2019d go right through it) even if the sense of feeling [i.e., touch] is stimulated, we must still only speak of phenomena in regards to the quartz crystal; we mustn\u2019t fantasize that there is some material reality there, no matter how the view of nature today (so far astray from reality) imagines it. So what we find as \u2018material\u2019 phenomena are not material phenomena at all, they are not actually matter, in reality. They are just phenomena; they are what comes and goes from another reality; another reality that we cannot understand if we don\u2019t think about it spiritually.\u201d<\/span>5<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Never Without Matter, Never Without Spirit<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, Steiner\u2019s understanding of reality proceeds from the assumption that \u201cspirit is never without matter, matter never without spirit.\u201d<\/span>6<\/sup><\/a><\/span> But then, what is matter? How can we understand it if not as point-like atomic particles underlying all sense phenomena? We must come to understand it as sensory appearance itself, what \u201ccomes and goes from another reality that we cannot understand if we don\u2019t think about it spiritually.\u201d Matter is spirit that is revealed sensorially. It is presented in a way wholly different from spirit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the dual unity of spirit and matter, spirit is what we more or less consciously encounter from within as experience or activity, and matter is spirit that is presented to us as sensible perception from without. Earthly reality results from the coming together of two very different manifestations of spirit (the \u201cother reality\u201d): an appearance that presents itself to us as spirit and soul and an appearance that presents itself to us as sense material and substance:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

From the depths of the world
The rich, abundance of matter, full of mystery,
Presses itself upon human sense.
From the heights of the world,
The clarifying word of spirit, full of content,
Streams into the ground of souls.
They converge in the human being
Into a wisdom-filled reality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Es dr\u00e4ngt sich an den Menschensinn
Aus Weltentiefen r\u00e4tselvoll
Des Stoffes reiche F\u00fclle.
Es str\u00f6mt in Seelengr\u00fcnde
Aus Weltenh\u00f6hen inhaltvoll
Des Geistes kl\u00e4rend Wort.
Sie treffen sich im Menscheninnern
Zu weisheitvoller Wirklichkeit.<\/span>7<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s remarkable that these two modes of appearance meet in the human being\u2014in an inner space that also is the world. In keeping with Rainer Maria Rilke, we can speak of a \u201cworld innerspace\u201d with regard to earthly reality as appearance.<\/span>8<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Material and Ephemeral Physis<\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

According to Steiner, matter, as a phenomenon perceived with our senses, can be regarded as the physical aspect of the world\u2014in contrast to the spiritual aspect of the world, which is a phenomenon perceived with our spiritual faculties (Imagination, Inspiration, Intuition).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some physical phenomena appear more \u201cmaterial\u201d than others. Something tangible that can be weighed, such as a crystal, has more of a material character in the initial direct perception of the world than something that appears to the eye but cannot be touched, such as a rainbow, which seems less material and more ephemeral. To paraphrase the philosopher George Berkeley, we can distinguish between things seen and things touched.<\/span>9<\/sup><\/a><\/span> We can distinguish between a more material and a more ephemeral mode of physical appearance. The lower of our twelve senses, therefore, constitute more of a material-physical world, and the upper more of an ephemeral-physical one. The differentiation of physical phenomena into more or less material manifestations is helpful and far-reaching. Birds don\u2019t usually appear to us through our lower senses. Do we ever touch the birds we see every day? We rarely, if ever, experience the material physical appearance of birds through some kind of touching or holding. Birds are creatures that primarily appear to us through our sense of sight and hearing, like some kind of angel. When we catch a bird, we expose it to the danger of becoming objectified.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the case of tangible and weighable material physis<\/em>, there\u2019s a danger of perceiving its appearance as the \u201cthing in itself.\u201d We say a table, as a physical object, is always there, even when we don\u2019t look at it or touch it, even when we are no longer in the room with it. A substance like sulfur has properties due to its molecular structure. Here is where Ahriman lurks, whispering in our ears this questionable conception of the world of appearances. By contrast, the view presented in this essay assumes that we humans are organized in such a way that we always manifest precisely what is relevant to us and our time. \u201cNature, or the being one refers to with this name, is always active and produces phenomena and events according to the needs of each moment, not, like some idle king relying on established legislation, simply folding its hands in its lap.\u201d Goethe marked this statement twice in the margin of his copy of Melchior Patrin\u2019s (1742\u20131815) Zweifel gegen die Entwicklungstheorie<\/em> [Doubts about the theory of evolution].<\/span>10<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

The Image of Spiritual Beings<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

If matter is something spiritual that appears sensorially, how can its spirituality be imagined? Our first experience of matter\u2019s spirituality is in our concepts. The other side of reality coagulates into them, and we grasp the essence of the world through concepts in our waking consciousness. If we increase this wakefulness to a seeing-thinking,<\/span>11<\/sup><\/a><\/span> we begin to deal with specific content-filled entities. We touch them with our thinking and feeling; we\u2019re encouraged to approach them, to explore them; we can also shy away from them when we begin to suspect what they contain, what they demand, or how they may want to revolutionize our view of the world. In a way similar to how we encounter other human beings, we encounter spiritual beings, spiritual wholes, and forms that have content and a way of being\u2014their own style of appearance. They can show us this side or that; they can pursue their own interests, impose themselves, hide themselves, and even deceive us. We can address them as spiritual beings, essences of mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sensory phenomena are thus manifestations of spiritual beings. They are images or mirrors of a spiritual world of beings that reveals itself to us through sensory phenomena. This mirror can be described, using Eastern spiritual terminology, as Maya\u2014a term Rudolf Steiner used often. This doesn\u2019t diminish the significance of Maya: sense perceptions are to be experienced and inwardly pictured as the direct presence of the spiritual world within human beings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is also expressed in Steiner\u2019s image of the senses as cavities where the spiritual external world projects into human beings. Taking this into account, human beings restrict themselves to their inner worlds, differentiated into thinking, feeling, and willing.<\/span>12<\/sup><\/a><\/span> Sense perceptions are not to be interpreted as a spiritual world that becomes transformed into some alien image of itself when sensed by a human being. Rather, the senses are the spiritual world itself within us. The human being \u201cdoes not have the system of senses inherently connected to him.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0It\u2019s not actually he who lives in this sense system but rather the environment. The environment has built itself and its essence into the sense organization. And the human being, through their image-beholding activity, also regards the sense organization as a piece of the external world.\u201d<\/span>13<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

The direct encounter with spiritual beings would overwhelm an unprepared consciousness\u2014consciousness would always fall asleep when the spiritual being revealed itself. The sensory, i.e., physical-material appearance, however, allows us to maintain our \u2018I\u2019-consciousness during the encounter with the spiritual beings of the world. Sensory phenomena are a mode of appearance dissimilar to the spiritual mode that we know through spiritual comprehension, but they are phenomena that allow us to maintain our \u2018I\u2019-consciousness (they even build up this \u2018I\u2019-consciousness) and make possible cognition of what manifests itself to human beings. What appears as Maya is spirit through and through. It\u2019s a spiritual<\/em>-material appearance and not a materialistic-material, atomistic appearance. It\u2019s a sensory depiction of what wants to show itself to us in it as a spiritual-soul entity.<\/span>14<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reading the Mirror of the Senses<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

What is presented here in a more general way can be extended from understanding through intuition to clairvoyant experience. Our task as human beings is to turn to the world of appearances and accept it as readable\u2014as a sensory appearance worth reading\u2014so that by reading the inner content, we learn to find the authors of what is written, that is, the world of nature beings\u2014from the elemental beings to the beings of the hierarchies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

Read world phenomena,
then surmise the writers,
then experience the being of the writers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Die Welterscheinungen lesen,
dann die Schreiber ahnen,
dann die Wesenheit der Schreiber erleben.<\/span>15<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Maya is not to be understood as a world from which we should turn away from, as if it contains only sin and suffering. That understanding of the sense world would subject us to another whisperer, Lucifer. On the contrary, the sensory Maya, as presented in this essay, is a mode of appearance to which we turn to come into a true, awake, and knowing encounter with the spirit. According to Rudolf Steiner, it is \u201cself-evident that when our spirit and soul leave the sheath of the body [in order to come to knowledge of spiritual beings], [the human being] thrusts themselves outwards through the senses.\u201d<\/span>16<\/sup><\/a><\/span>,<\/span>17<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The world we reach here is no longer sensory\u2014no longer spatial or temporal. It\u2019s a world we experience outside of space and time. That means it is free of mental pictures. And yet, we can experience it! How? By the fact that we live through our experience of it, we direct our gaze towards these inner soul experiences when faced with sensory phenomena.<\/span>18<\/sup><\/a><\/span> The innerspace of the world proves not to be empty at all, nor without lawfulness. It shows itself to be carried by beings. We read the sensory outer world as an inner world, as a large spiritual organism that consists of many different beings and regions of being\u2014like a colony of bees made up of many different beings and their associated tasks.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"
Hans-Christian Zehnter<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

How does this experience of spiritual beings feel in our soul space? It feels like an encounter; we encounter something defined by a specific content; we experience meaning and the creation of meaning\u2014not in the sense of specific mental pictures, but in the sense of an experience of being filled or embraced. Our soul becomes a vessel for the presence of spiritual beings; we become a vessel for the essences of the things of which we are inwardly aware. Joseph Beuys would have characterized this inner presence with the term \u201cdirectional forces\u201d [Richtkr\u00e4fte<\/em>]. Gernot B\u00f6hme spoke of atmospheres, moods, impressions, or (with reference to Walter Benjamin) auras.<\/span>19<\/sup><\/a><\/span> One can also speak of regions in this world innerspace, of regions that correspond more to fields of activity than to spatial territories. In terms of experience, they resemble domains, specific atmospheric moods that we wander through inwardly. In the ecclesiastical tradition of Middle Europe, the bearers of these domains are referred to as the heavenly hierarchies. Traditionally, these heavenly hosts are divided into three main groups: the highest or first hierarchy of the Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones; the middle or second hierarchy, of Kyriotetes, Dynamis, Exusiai; the lowest or third hierarchy of Archai, Archangels, and Angels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The working of these three hierarchical groups can be experienced within our souls as thinking, feeling, and willing. What we call \u201cwilling\u201d is our experience of the first hierarchy\u2019s work upon the ground of our soul; what we call \u201cfeeling\u201d is our experience of the working of the second Hierarchy; and what we call \u201cthinking\u201d is the experience of the working of the third Hierarchy upon our soul\u2019s foundations.<\/span>20<\/sup><\/a><\/span> The world of the divine hosts thinks, feels, and wills within us.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"
Martin Rozumek<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

But, when we turn to the sense world, we notice that we experience something very similar there. For example, when looking at ruminants, we not only discover a strong emphasis on the metabolic and limb systems, we also experience it. We can have the same experience when looking at a flying bird as we do when we think independently and autonomously.<\/span>21<\/sup><\/a><\/span> We can experience feeling in the versatile feline, who alternates smoothly between lustful predation to blissful, sleepy mildness. What is revealed as the threefolding of the animal world can also be found in the unified orientation between the human being\u2019s above, middle, and below. Looking downwards brings the world of matter, darkness, and heaviness before us. Looking upwards, the sun-drenched blue sky lifts us into the lightness of thought; looking around the world reveals all its soulful and multicolored variegation.<\/span>22<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The End of the Paths of God<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The physical world as sensory appearance is the outermost emanation of a spiritual world innerspace consisting exclusively of spiritual entities. In the words of Friedrich Christoph Oetinger (1702\u20131782), physical appearance is the end of the path of God,<\/span>23<\/sup><\/a><\/span> the outer onion skin, as it were, of a spiritual world of beings. Behind this last layer, there\u2019s no further emanation; there\u2019s no atomic matter out of which physical appearance arises. This last layer is itself the material aspect of the spiritual world innerspace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Implications<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Today, materialism is no longer a theory about what makes up the world. Over the past hundred years, it\u2019s become an almost unquestioned attitude toward life itself. We initially perceive the world as material. New views of the world are emerging rather slowly, and new attitudes towards life are developing even more slowly. We\u2019d like to contribute to this growth and stimulate discussion about it, especially within the anthroposophical movement. Today, we cannot remain indifferent to how we think about the world. As human beings, the further we follow the point-based understanding of atomism, the further we drive the development of the Earth into the state of a godless, illusory world. To return to the beginning of this essay: by holding onto the mental pictures of \u201catoms in themselves,\u201d we speak in favor of a \u201cmaterialism leading to destruction.\u201d Through this way of looking at nature, we turn it into a sub-nature controlled by mechanical laws.<\/span>24<\/sup><\/a><\/span> The Earth\u2014along with us\u2014is driven in a direction of development that detaches it further and further from its origin out of the divine-spiritual world of beings, and turns away from this divine-spiritual world\u2019s intentions to return the Earth and ourselves, through freedom, to their spiritual origins:<\/span>25<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

Earth, is this not what you want:
Invisibly, to arise within us?\u2014
Isn\u2019t it your dream
one day to be invisible?\u2014
Earth! Invisible!
What, if not transformation,
is your urgent mission?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Erde, ist es nicht dies, was du willst:
Unsichtbar in uns erstehn? \u2013
Ist es dein Traum nicht,
einmal unsichtbar zu sein? \u2013
Erde! unsichtbar!
Was, wenn Verwandlung nicht,
ist dein dr\u00e4ngender Auftrag?<\/span>26<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Translation <\/strong>Joshua Kelberman
Graphics <\/strong>Nina Gautier, 2025. Nina Gautier, a Swiss product designer and herbalist, is currently based in Basel, Switzerland. From 2015 to 2019, she worked as a graphic designer for the Weekly. Now, she works as a freelance designer. More <\/strong>Nina Gauti<\/a>er<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chemist Martin Rozumek and biologist Hans-Christian Zehnter have written separately on the subject of how the world can be understood without an atomistic conception of matter. They see earthly reality as an appearance specifically intended for us human beings. This has methodological and existential consequences for our relation to the world. They decided to write a joint essay for Das Goetheanum to accompany the publication of their recent articles in Merkurstab (Martin Rozumek) and Archivmagazin (Hans-Christian Zehnter). The starting point […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21415,"featured_media":63159,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8788,8839,8793],"tags":[11621,8798,11622],"class_list":["post-63729","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-essay-en","category-nature-experience","category-philosophy","tag-ausgabe-7-2025-en","tag-deepening","tag-english-issue-9-2025"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63729","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21415"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63729"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63729\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}