5. The Human Being as Living Gospel

A Contemplation on the Fifth Essence of the Cross

The four creatures of the Apocalypse — Eagle, Lion, Bull, and Angel — form a living mandala around the throne.
They are not symbols of power but revelations of divine order in movement.
Each embodies a cosmic gesture:

• the Eagle — seeing;
• the Lion — feeling;
• the Bull — willing;
• the Angel — harmonizing.

Yet at the center of their fourfold dance stands something greater: the Human Being — not as we now are, but as we are becoming.
For the human being is destined to become the fifth of these beings — the one in whom the four are gathered and redeemed.

1. The Fifth Point: The Heart of the Cross

If we trace the four beings as points of a cross, its center is open — an unoccupied heart-space.
This center is the place of freedom.
The Eagle cannot descend, the Bull cannot rise, the Lion cannot balance without this empty point through which the divine may enter.
The human being, standing upright, inhabits this center.

In us, the world finds its mirror and its mediator.
Through our thinking, feeling, and willing, the scattered forces of creation are brought into dialogue.
When the “I” awakens, this dialogue becomes conscious.
And when love enters the “I,” the dialogue becomes redemptive.

Thus, the cross is not a symbol of suffering alone but of synthesis — the meeting of heaven and earth within the human heart.

2. The Human as Fifth Gospel

The ancient world read the divine in stars and temples;
the future world will read it in the human form.
For the human being is the Gospel of becoming — the text in which the universe learns to pronounce its own name.

Each of the four written Gospels reveals one aspect of this total human archetype:

• John shows the light of spirit — the Eagle’s clarity.
• Mark reveals the fire of courage — the Lion’s warmth.
• Luke embodies compassion in deed — the Bull’s devotion.
• Matthew harmonizes heaven and earth — the Angel’s balance.

But the fifth Gospel is not written on parchment; it is inscribed in flesh and ether.
It is the life of the human being transformed by Christ — the Word made word again, through deed, through love.

3. The Meeting of Above and Below

In the moment of true self-awareness, something cosmic happens.
The light of the Eagle descends through thought, the heat of the Lion pulses through feeling, the strength of the Bull rises through will — and in their crossing, a still point forms: the I Am.

Here the individual no longer says, “I think,” “I feel,” “I will,” but “I am” —
the quiet affirmation that all three are held in one consciousness.
At that moment, the human being ceases to be a creature of the world and becomes a co-creator within it.

Through this act of balance, the entire cosmos regains coherence.
The human being becomes the axis mundi, the upright cross upon which time and eternity meet.

4. The Christic Center

Steiner once said that the Christ Mystery is not only a historical event but a continuing incarnation within the etheric body of humanity.
Through it, the human form becomes transparent to divine intention.
Each of the four beings finds its reconciliation in this center —
the Eagle illumined by love, the Lion tempered by humility, the Bull uplifted by grace, the Angel crowned by freedom.

To live from this center is to become a living sacrament:
a human being through whom the world can again perceive the moral sunlight of creation.

This is the destiny toward which evolution tends —
not the perfection of intellect or power, but the awakening of the heart as organ of universal memory and resurrection.

5. Contemplative Practice

Stand quietly and imagine the cross of the four beings around you:
the Eagle above your head, the Lion before your heart, the Bull beneath your feet, the Angel at your back.
Let their gestures stream toward you — light, warmth, strength, and peace.
At their meeting point, sense a still flame.

This flame is your “I,” yet not yours alone — it is the world’s awakening within you.
Let it expand until it embraces all directions.
In this moment, you stand as the fifth being —
the Human as Living Gospel,
where the Word of creation finds its echo in freedom and love.