Secrets of the Threshold
GA 147
These lectures, given just after the first performance of The Souls' Awakening, give details of the experience of spiritual development and the crossing of the threshold of the spiritual world. Steiner says that humanity now stands at this threshold and the keys to crossing are self-knowledge, self-control and a clear recognition of the working of Lucifer and Ahriman. These lectures contain some of Steiner's most significant insights into the path to higher knowledge.
The eight lectures presented here were given between August 24 and August 31 of 1913 in Munich. In the Collected Edition of Rudolf Steiner's works in German, the volume containing the German texts is entitled Die Geheimnisse der Schwelle (Vol. 147 in the Bibliographic Survey). They were translated from the German by Ruth Pusch.
| Foreword | ||
| Lecture I | August 24, 1913 | |
| Life after death as shown in The Souls' Awakening. Most souls sleep through the Cosmic Midnight or Saturn time; those who are prepared stay awake. The soul awakens in different ways, but perfect calm is necessary. The mood of expectation. | ||
| Lecture II | August 25, 1913 | |
| Clairvoyant consciousness between the sensible and super-sensible worlds. The working of Ahriman and Lucifer. What is evil? The dangers in crossing the threshold. | ||
| Lecture III | August 26, 1913 | |
| The elemental world; sleeping and waking, sympathy and antipathy. Ahriman and Lucifer in the elemental world. | ||
| Lecture IV | August 27, 1913 | |
| Ascent of the soul from the elemental to the spiritual world. Reading the Cosmic Script in the realm of the spirit. The Cosmic Word. | ||
| Lecture V | August 28, 1913 | |
| The importance of the law of number and measure. The triad in everything. Felicia Balde's story of the castle-fortress. Solitary thinking, writing and the spoken word. Meditation. | ||
| Lecture VI | August 29, 1913 | |
| Ahriman and Lucifer in the realm of art. The meeting of the soul crossing the threshold with the other self; the spirit-conversation, as the soul develops spiritual consciousness, with living thought-beings. | ||
| Lecture VII | August 30, 1913 | |
| The maturing of Johannes Thomasius during the four Mystery Dramas; his relation to the Double, the Spirit of his Youth, and the Other Philia. Strader at the abyss. | ||
| Lecture VIII | August 31, 1913 | |
| Lucifer and Ahriman in the past and present. The Guardian of the Threshold, our true self. Self-knowledge. The necessity for a feeling of responsibility. | ||
| Words of Welcome | ||