Mystery of the Christ: Aspects of Christology in the Work of Rudolf Steiner

Who is the Christ? What is the “Sun spirit”? How should we understand the person of Jesus in relation to the Cosmic Christ or even to the Holy Trinity?

Oskar Kürten creates a mutually reconcilable and coherent text in his majestic overview of Rudolf Steiner’s extensive references to Christ and Jesus dispersed throughout his numerous writings and lectures. We accompany the author as he tries to comprehend the unimaginably vast enigma of Christ’s appearance on Earth. The results of Steiner’s work can sometimes be overwhelming, but as Kürten points out, “Humanity is always advancing in its intellectual and spiritual culture, and each step poses higher demands on our capacity to understand.”

In a volume comprising three previously untranslated booklets―originally intended as study material for people conversant with the fundamentals of anthroposophy―Mystery of the Christ offers numerous pointers toward great mysteries, inviting readers to penetrate ever more deeply into this inexhaustible subject. As Kürten states, this approach enables us “again and again to find surprisingly new insights into the mysterious interconnections in which Christ’s entry into earth-existence and the Mystery of Golgotha are placed.”

Oskar Lambert Kürten, PhD,was born in Anleur, Belgium, in 1886. He lost his hearing during his student years, becoming almost completely deaf. Despite this, he held a senior position in the Berlin State Statistical Office for more than fifty years. He developed an interest in spiritual worldviews and had an inner experience that anthroposophy would become his personal path. He lived for and out of anthroposophy, especially Rudolf Steiner’s Christ impulse, penning the trilogy contained in Mystery of the Christ. Kürten is also the author of Symphonies of Creation: The Primal Elementary Kingdoms in the Work of Rudolf Steiner (Temple Lodge 2018). He died in 1973 in Berlin.