This piece is the second in a three-part series on the esoteric sources of Zviad Gamsakhurdia’s worldview. The first piece introduces the series and provides theoretical and historical context for its material and claims. This piece focuses on anthroposophy. The third piece will focus on Georgian Christian mysticism.
Anthroposophy
Zviad Gamsakhurdia (1939–1993) was likely introduced to anthroposophy through his father, the celebrated novelist Konstantine Gamsakhurdia (1893–1975). Konstantine had attended Rudolf Steiner’s lectures while studying in Europe and found them resonant enough that he was willing to express, publicly, on Soviet radio that anthroposophy was among his “greatest inspirations” (Williams 2023). Zviad was no less enthusiastic about anthroposophy, writing commentaries on the thought of figures like Johann Wolfgang von Goethe from an avowedly “anthroposophical perspective” and undertaking the difficult task of translating Steiner’s works into Georgian with his friend (and fellow dissident) Merab Kostava (1939–1989) (Gamsakhurdia 1984).
Yet, Gamsakhurdia was, and remained, a devout Orthodox Christian. He saw anthroposophy not as “a religion or confession but a cognitive trend,” identifying Steiner as “a follower of Christ and Christianity, and the creator of a new cognitive form of Christianity” (Gamsakhurdia 1990). This framing allowed anthroposophy to function within and complement Orthodox tradition rather than compete with it. Indeed, Gamsakhurdia emphasized that Steiner himself “was closely connected with Orthodox philosophy,” considered Vladimir Solovyov “one of his forerunners,” and regarded the Orthodox “cult and ritual” as spiritually superior to Catholicism—as “something that reaches the soul with the profoundest reverence,” not just “symbols to be viewed by the eye” (Gamsakhurdia 1990).
While Gamsakhurdia’s affinity for anthroposophy is clear, it is difficult to identify exactly what parts of Steiner’s extensive corpus—thousands of lectures and writings spanning cosmology, epistemology, Christology, agriculture, pedagogy, and medicine[1]—were of most interest to him. As his son Konstantin explained, “[Zviad] never shared the background of his ideas with the Georgian people, except perhaps a few friends” (Gamsakhurdia 2002). Even the “interviews for a few anthroposophical journals” that he did “all took place privately and had a very limited distribution” (Gamsakhurdia 2002). Even so, by examining his lectures and writings, we can ascertain which ideas proved influential enough that they continually re-emerged—and played a central role—in his thought.
Spiritual Evolution
Chief among these, I believe, was Steiner’s idea of spiritual evolution. Steiner taught that, since entering the post-Atlantean age, humanity has moved through distinct cultural epochs—Ancient Indian, Persian, Egyptian-Chaldean, Greco-Roman, and the current Anglo-German (Steiner 1910). Each cultural epoch, Steiner claimed, has furthered the spiritual development of humanity’s “members” (that is, the independently appearing elements which, in their totality, make up the essence of human beings) (Steiner 1904).
The Ancient Indians developed the etheric body, “a compressed image of cosmic lawfulness” (Steiner 1904–1923). The Persians began developing the astral body, manifesting passions, instincts, and thoughts (Steiner 1908b). The Greco-Romans guided the education of the intellectual soul, making possible the human “I”—“that center in one’s soul which can lead to the actual self” (Steiner 1909–1910). Now, in the current epoch, the Anglo-Germans will develop the consciousness soul, bringing “pure contemplation of the sense world” and “free imagination” (Steiner 1916). Yet, this epoch will also see egoism increase (Steiner 1905). The coming sixth cultural epoch, Steiner claimed, will counterbalance this by inaugurating a “worldwide culture of brotherly love” and developing the “spirit self” (Steiner 1905).
These ideas were very appealing to Gamsakhurdia, providing him with the vocabulary he needed to articulate a vision of Georgian distinctiveness—and grand importance—in cosmic terms.[2] There was just one problem: Steiner had not unambiguously assigned the mission of bringing about the next spiritual awakening in the post-Atlantean age to the Georgians (Gamsakhurdia 1990; Steiner 1922). Indeed, Steiner’s terminology for the people who would inaugurate the sixth cultural epoch varied across his lectures. In his 1905 lectures, he specified that it would “emanate from the West-Asian peoples and the advanced Slavs”—a formulation that could theoretically encompass Georgia as a West Asian nation—though, ultimately, Steiner’s more frequent references were to the “Russian” or “Slavic” people and their special spiritual destiny (Steiner 1905; Steiner 1918).[3]
Despite this, Steiner’s descriptions of how the sixth cultural epoch would arrive and what it would look like were quite clear. The transformation would, first, be heralded by a spiritual awakening analogous to—but surpassing—Christ’s first coming. Steiner came to this conclusion because he associated the sixth cultural epoch with the Age of Aquarius, beginning around 3573 CE, and identified Aquarius (the water-bearer) with John the Baptist, who had baptized with water and announced Christ’s arrival (Steiner 1905). Just as John preceded Christ in the fourth epoch, preparing humanity to receive divine revelation, so too would the same spiritual individuality[4] (whether as John or in another form) herald the sixth cultural epoch’s arrival (Steiner, n.d.). Steiner then, rather interestingly, connected John the Baptist to John the Evangelist, stating that the former effectively became the latter through Lazarus, whom Christ raised from the dead after four days in the tomb.[5] To quickly explain: John the Baptist had died, but his “I” had enlivened Lazarus, who, in Christian initiation, became John the Evangelist. This identification was symbolically profound: The figure of John-Lazarus represented the soul’s awakening from spiritual death, the revelation of hidden mysteries (as John’s Gospel and Apocalypse revealed Christ’s deepest teachings), and the promise of resurrection into higher consciousness. The sixth cultural epoch, then, would see Christianity “blossom” as its esoteric dimensions—long hidden or suppressed—became manifest and united with exoteric practice, particularly through wisdom traditions like those of the Knights Templar, who had brought Eastern mystery knowledge to the West (and whose Holy Grail symbolized this synthesis of spiritual currents) (Steiner 1906).
The people destined to lead this epoch would, then, need to embody these characteristics: Prophetic consciousness, the capacity to reveal hidden wisdom, and the synthesis of Eastern and Western spiritual traditions. Indeed, while Steiner’s references to the specific people meant to usher it in remained ambiguous, his vision of what the sixth cultural epoch itself would look like was precise.
For Gamsakhurdia, this precision mattered. In his view, the symbolic framework Steiner constructed was directly connected to elements within the Georgian Christian mystical tradition. Indeed, he saw in Steiner’s cosmic history a lens through which to understand Georgian tradition, and in that tradition, evidence pointing toward a destined role for Georgia in Steiner’s cosmic history. To understand why Gamsakhurdia believed the “West-Asian peoples” formulation identified Georgia—and why the synthesis of Eastern and Western wisdom, John-Lazarus, and the Holy Grail became central to his argument—requires examining his engagement with Georgian Christian mysticism, the subject of the next (and final) piece in this series.
ENDNOTES
[1] Anthroposophical medicine also appears to have been of great interest to Gamsakhurdia. In “The Spiritual Mission of Georgia,” he claims that “anthroposophic medicine played an outstanding role here in the treatment of those poisoned on 9 April when these patients failed to respond to the treatment prescribed by traditional physicians and to drugs, representatives of anthroposophic medicine arrived with remedies, developed in their school, which saved many persons” (Gamsakhurdia 1990).
[2] These terms are all my own, but I feel they aptly describe the point and/or end result of Gamsakhurdia’s theorizing. He never really provided clear terminology around what he was doing (other than “spiritual mission,” which I note in the introduction and conclusion), and he certainly never spoke as if he were attempting to legitimize a nationalist project; it was, in his thinking, simply a truth about the world which he was articulating.
[3] In lecture 6 of The Challenge of the Times, “The Innate Capacities of the Nations of the World” (December 8, 1918), Steiner states that “the Slavic people of the East […] hold the germ of the future” and that “the Russian people’s culture will continue to be a culture of revelation for a long time, even to the dawning of the sixth post-Atlantean epoch.”
[4] In Steiner’s anthroposophy, “individuality” refers to the immortal spiritual core of a human being that reincarnates across multiple lifetimes, distinct from the personality of any single incarnation.
[5] The identification of John the Evangelist with Lazarus is found in various esoteric Christian traditions. While Steiner referenced this tradition in his lectures, the connection was particularly emphasized by Gamsakhurdia in his exegetical work, where he notes that both esoteric and modern philological scholarship have observed the unique relationship between Jesus and Lazarus described in John’s Gospel using the Greek word phileo (spiritual love/friendship), the same term used for “the beloved disciple.”
REFERENCES
Gamsakhurdia, Konstantin. “Swiad Gamsachurdia und die Anthroposophie” [Zviad Gamsakhurdia and Anthroposophy]. Der Europäer [The European] 7, no. 5. March 2002.
Gamsakhurdia, Zviad. “Goet’es msoplmkhedveloba antrop’osopiuri tvalsazrisit” [Goethe’s Weltanschauung from the Anthroposophic Point of View]. Ts’isk’ari [The Dawn], no. 5 (1984).
Gamsakhurdia, Zviad. “Sakartvelos sulieri missia” [The Spiritual Mission of Georgia]. Lecture delivered at the Idriart Festival, Tbilisi Philharmonic House, May 2, 1990.
Steiner, Rudolf. Theosophy. GA 9. 1904.
Steiner, Rudolf. The Apocalypse of St. John. GA 104. 1908.
Steiner, Rudolf. At the Gates of Spiritual Science. GA 95. 1906.
Steiner, Rudolf. The Challenge of the Times. GA 186. 1918.
Steiner, Rudolf. Collected Essays on Philosophy and Anthroposophy. GA 35. 1904–1923.
Steiner, Rudolf. Egyptian Myths and Mysteries. GA 106. 1908.
Steiner, Rudolf. Foundations of Esotericism. GA 93a. 1905.
Steiner, Rudolf. Inner Impulses of Evolution. GA 171. 1916.
Steiner, Rudolf. Esoteric Lessons. GA 266a. n.d.
Steiner, Rudolf. Metamorphoses of the Soul: Paths of Experience. GA 58. 1909–1910.
Steiner, Rudolf. Occult History. GA 126. 1910–1911.
Steiner, Rudolf. Supersensible Influences in the History of Mankind. GA 216. 1922.
Williams, Nathaniel. “Georgia: A Center of the World.” Goetheanum. December 10, 2023.
Author
Alexander John Paul Lutz is (as of early 2026) a Max Kampelman Policy Fellow at the U.S. Helsinki Commission, a Junior Fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council (working mostly within the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute), and the Caucasus Editor at Lossi 36. His research explores religion and spirituality as spaces for the creation, legitimization, and contestation of visions of belonging, meaning, and purpose in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union.