The Rudolf Steiner Archive

In ancient mystery schools, candidates resolved to devote their incarnation entirely to initiation, for it was a do or die procedure. They had to undergo trials that required great courage. Terrifying things were shown that killed some of them. But if they survived, they had come to the other shore and were reborn. They had descended to the God within them, had encountered drives, desires and passions in their bodies and had passed the test. Then they would say of themselves: Ex Deo nascimur. Well, one could ask: Does this evil that one encounters on the way to the inner God also come from the Gods? Here we must tell ourselves that it was originally something divine which we made into something evil.

Men trod the path of ecstasy in the Druidic mysteries. The candidate united himself with the spirit that worked everywhere in nature: Per Spiritum Sanctum reviviscimus.

These two paths are united in the Rosicrucian path, that is, what's good for us is taken from both. One can no longer initiate a modern unconsciously. Since the breaking in of the Christ-principle, a man must be there with his waking consciousness.

The meditations that the masters of wisdom and of the harmony of feelings have given us are all directed towards the Christ, even if his name doesn't occur in them. The words: In the pure rays of light are arranged in such a way that if one makes oneself deaf and blind for one's immediate environment, one slowly lifts one's etheric body out of the physical one, and thereby one unites oneself with the Christ-etheric aura, which is now our earth's aura. If we would lift ourselves out of the body without our meditation's content, then our soul would be alone with itself. But now it's permeated by Christ and it experiences what Paul called “I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me.”

In the pure love for all beings. These words remind us that all soul things are woven out of love. This meditation is a slow dying of the lower ego. And we have the connection between the two paths in this dying into Christ and coming to life in him in: In Christo morimur. It's a conscious coming to life in the Christ spirit. That's why we've added the word Sanctum to the words Per Spiritum.

In this [German] Edition the verses are given as Rudolf Steiner spoke them during the Christmas Conference of 1923, as shown by the complete and reliable record in shorthand made by Helene Finckh. Previous editions [in German] contained variations in some of the verses, especially in the rendering of 25 December. This is explained as follows:

Rudolf Steiner gave the verses in two versions, both of which are recorded in his own handwriting (see Facsimiles 1 and 4 in the Supplement). The first version was used during the Conference. The second version was made for the printed record in the report ‘Die Bildung der Allgemeinen Anthroposophischen Gesellschaft durch die Weihnachts-tagung 1923’ (The Formation of the General Anthroposophical Society through the Christmas Conference of 1923) in the first number of Was in der Anthroposophischen Gesellschaft vorgeht. Nachrichten für deren Mitglieder (What is Happening in the Anthroposophical Society. News for Members) of 13 January 1924. In this second version there are certain divergences from the text as spoken during the Conference. The most important of these are that the hierarchies are not named but approached under a general designation, and that the Rosicrucian motto is given in German and not in Latin.

The reason which moved Rudolf Steiner to make this alteration was given on a number of occasions by Marie Steiner, and recorded by one of her colleagues, Günther Schubert, as follows: ‘She spoke repeatedly about her memory of the great difficulty Rudolf Steiner experienced in reaching the decision to publish the verses of the 1923 laying of the Foundation Stone. In the end he toned down the direct approach to the hierarchies by making the salutation more abstract. He wanted this toned-down version to be the one used exclusively within members' circles too, for he said that there was a law attached to esoteric mantrams of such a cultic nature: The force with which they return equal to that with which they are sent forth, and it is therefore necessary to ask oneself whether one will be strong enough to endure this.’

Marie Steiner originally wanted to take this into account when she published this record of the Christmas Foundation Meeting. However, it was only possible in respect of the words spoken on 25 December, for on 29 December the call to the hierarchies by name was included in Rudolf Steiner's subsequent discussion of the ‘rhythms’. The relevant lines were not spoken on the other days.

In the present [German] edition the verses, including that of 25 December, are given as they were spoken and recorded in the shorthand report.

Text from Rudolf Steiner's original manuscript ¹
Notebook archive number 612

All metal objects of value, determined by the conditions of the external world, are taken from the person to be initiated: jewelry, money, etc. This removes him from the context of the physical world and its laws. He must feel detached from the value that his own soul does not give him.

Then the person to be initiated is led to the gate, accompanied by the person acting as his guide. Before reaching the gate, a bandage is tied before his eyes. Upon the knock of the initiating personality (..-² ) the following conversation ensues between the initiating personality and the personality received in the inner room:

Question: Who knocks ardently at our door?

Answer: A free man (a free woman) who wants to be admitted to the mystical temple of wisdom, beauty and strength, to sacrifice and serve the spirit in communion with the older brothers of humanity.

Question: What is his (her) name?

Answer: Name.

Question: Who vouches for him (for her)?

Answer: The names of two guarantors.

Question: Are all conditions fulfilled?

Answer: They are fulfilled.

The recipient: He (she) enters.

The initiate is led by the introducer in spirals into the “room of self-knowledge”. Here he is addressed by an older initiate in the following way:

So, we are at the right place. I come from the universe of Canis Major. I met this soul on the way that leads from the north. She has discarded her body. She has arrived at the gate of death. $o listen, soul, now to the spirit, which wants to and can lead you to your full human dignity. Since you are no longer afflicted with senses and a mind that draws its strength from a body, your gaze no longer encounters the things and occurrences in your surroundings through which the spirit, which I have had to fight since the beginning of the earth, robs you of your freedom and only wants to make you a serving member of its own being. In your environment, nothing lives of its creation, which you always had to encounter in the sense body when you turned your gaze outwards. So my opponent instilled his essence into your soul; you were not yourself; you were filled with his essence within. Now you can draw everything you experience from within yourself; now you can be master, sole master in the world, which creates itself from within you. Only now will you know yourself completely, will you live in your human dignity. So feel yourself. Be yourself. When you fully understand yourself, you cannot help but find your home in the world to which I have led you. So, self-aware, you penetrate from my opponent's creation into your own world, here where everything is silent around you.

There is complete silence for a while. Silent calm reigns... This is interrupted after some time by heavy knocks (.. -).

The mystic who has just spoken continues:

My opponent, whom I have been fighting since the beginning of the earth, is approaching. He wants to oust me from this place. It is he who wants to make your soul a limb of his being. If you follow him, you will lose your human dignity. You will become a slave to his being. But for now I must give way to him. Do not fall for him, soul!

The mystic who performs the service at the altar of the East now begins to speak:

I have recognized in you, O soul, that the temptations of the spirit that has been fighting me since the beginning of the earth have given you a tendency towards his words. He was able to make you feel that it was good for your human dignity to follow him. I, the Spirit of the East, am now standing here before you. My opponent has now had to give way for me. Around me stand the judges of the terrible court of the dead. I ask them: What should be done with the soul, at the bottom of which I see an inclination towards the spirit that has been fighting me since the beginning of the earth?

The surrounding mystics answer:

You have to bring this soul to hell.

The servant-mystic of the East:

You bring this soul to hell.

Then the one to be received is led again in a spiral circle into a room that represents hell. One hears the clanking of chains and the locking of a door when the one to be received arrives in the room.

The mystic from the East now speaks:

You soul, you are in the place where the longing of your soul can be fulfilled. You are in your own world. Henceforth you will never again come across a creation with your gaze that does not originate from your own soul. You will live entirely in your own world and will be able to be the sole master in it. But know that you will live in your isolated world for all eternity. But you will never be able to find anything, not even anything of all that has become dear and precious to you in the world into which I have led you. For all eternity you will not learn anything about beings that you have grown fond of, that you would have liked to help. They will never be able to learn anything from you. In all future time you will know nothing but only yourself. And so also recognize the silence, the loneliness, which will surround you endlessly from the outside. And know that the further you will only live in yourself, the more dreadful your life will be. You will look into an empty future eternity, in which you will be able to enjoy nothing but only your own being! This life with a view into eternity will become more terrible the more you live towards it. Your inclination towards my opponent has condemned you to this; the judges of my terrible court of the dead have only put into words what your soul has condemned itself to. But I may, by virtue of the grace that also radiates from the East, now show you once more what you have gone through on earth. Perhaps your soul will develop a different inclination when you, armed with insight into everything that my opponent promised you and what I have to impose on you here, see once again what you have become. Therefore I will guide you through your earthly past and show your soul what my messengers from the east have granted you during your earthly course so that you could become what you are now. I have sent them, these wise messengers of mine; now they may once more bring to your ears what they have accomplished in you during your earthly course.

Again the chains are heard to clink violently, and the lock (of hell) opens with a loud noise.

A mystic appointed for this purpose calls out the words:

The journey backwards through life is now to begin. While the person being initiated is led back through the spiral paths, the mystic who has already spoken the last words says the following:

1. Man walks through his whole life in darkness; only the knowledge of the spirit can snatch him from darkness.

2. If the soul is driven to the spirit only by curiosity or a thirst for knowledge, it will not find the spirit. For only those beings find the spirit who recognize that they do not belong to themselves, but to the world, and who therefore feel the duty within themselves to make themselves as perfect as possible as a member of the world as a whole. Duty of knowing the spirit: you shall feel it.

3. If you do not want to penetrate so deeply into human souls that all earthly differences disappear before your gaze, and you see all people as they present themselves without differences, one like the other, you cannot come to knowledge; for this is attained only by the one who sees all people as equal, without the differences that the world, steeped in darkness, has imprinted on them.

4. If the soul is not inclined to hold up her weaknesses and errors in clear observation, she will not find the way to spiritual knowledge; for every unrecognized error is an obstacle that stands in the way of knowledge.

After the candidate has heard these four sentences during his spiral walk, a staircase is placed in his path, which he has to climb. Having reached the top step, he is made to fall down on the other side. During this ascent and fall, the following words are spoken by the appointed mystic:

You also sought to find the light for your soul on your previous path; but you climbed the heights of the path of life in darkness. This ascent makes you visually aware of your ascent in darkness. You can only reach the heights of life by following the light received from the spirit; without it you must fall, as you are falling now.

After this, the person to be initiated is led to the two pillars that are located at the entrance to the room that symbolizes the ancient Atlantic land. The person to be initiated is placed in front of these pillars; and the appointed mystic speaks the following:

You have traveled backwards through the incarnations you have lived through since the great Atlantic catastrophe with the gaze of your soul. Now you have arrived at the epoch of this catastrophe. You stand at the Pillars of Hercules, which once led from the east to the northwest into the old Atlantic land. Consider that you have gone through further previous incarnations in this Atlantean land. You lived through these under completely different conditions than the later ones in the post-Atlantean time. The Atlantean land was shaped in such a way that the ground was filled with dense water fog vapors. Within the constant water fog, you lived in a completely different human form than later in the post-Atlantean time. In this time, the air had become free from the constant water vapor. Accordingly, the whole perception and experience of man had changed. The post-Atlantic time is the air test of humanity; the process of incarnations of the Atlantic time is the water test of humanity. During the test of the air, the messengers of the good spirit from the East have allowed the simple but deeply meaningful principles you have heard to flow into all the life of your soul. These principles are the impulses that lead all souls to good, which the wise men of the East always saw before them as if written in gold in the spiritual writing of the world; through them they wanted to lead your soul to salvation. But my opponent, who fights against me, has mixed his impulses into everything that was permeated by these impulses, and these impulses have always implanted corruption instead of salvation. If you could now turn your gaze towards the east and the reality would appear to you in the spirit, you would see my eagle in the bright heights, which wanted to bring you the wisdom of the east. But beneath him you would see my opponent's vulture, which has so influenced your thinking that wisdom must become a consuming power for you, and destroy you by wasting your strength to the extent that you sought to attain wisdom by earthly thinking.

If you could turn the gaze of your soul towards the south, you would see in the heights of light my angel, who was to bring your feeling the revelation of beauty; but my opponent points you to the owl below, which must add to the revelation of spiritual beauty the forces that, when your soul dwells outside the body at night while you sleep, implant in it the urge which rebels against beauty and wants to lead your feelings away from the revelation of the spiritual. If you could turn the soul's gaze to the west, you would see in the light heights my lion, as the messenger who could have endowed your soul with the power that comes from the spirit and that would make you spiritually strong; but below my lion you would see my opponent's black raven, which implants in your soul the urge to always cover up spiritual power with physical strength.

Thus, by going through the post-Atlantic incarnations, your soul could never have received unmixed, unmixed, what the wise messengers of the progressing world spirits wanted to give you. They received it mixed with the disastrous gifts of my opponent, who has been fighting me since the beginning of the earth.

After this, the mystic who has led the person to be received into the “space of self-knowledge” enters again. He speaks the following:

You have entered the time of the Atlantic catastrophe, in which you are wandering backwards with your soul's gaze. This is the time when the spirit, which I have had to fight since the beginning of the earth, cannot completely silence me. So now I can also tell your soul what you have received from me in your post-Atlantic incarnations. Without me you would never have attained the knowledge that your mind acquired by freely observing the creatures and events on earth. For He, who directs the cosmic order I am fighting against, wanted to instill His wisdom alone into your mind; He wanted to live in your thinking, feeling and willing. Only He Himself wanted to live in you; you were to represent only Him in your life. Your speech was to resound with His glory alone. I have so permeated your speech with My Being that you can express your impulses of thinking, feeling and willing in speaking. I have caused my brother, who, like me, has been fighting that other spirit since the beginning of the earth, to enable you to preserve in writing on earth what could only live under the other spirit's sole guidance in the words he had permeated, and what would have to perish with the word. So judge what has made you what you are in the course of the post-Atlantic incarnations. Judge what you would be today without speech, which can express not only the supersensible but also, through me, the sensible, without writing. I am the Bringer of Earthly Culture; without me you would be the image of a divine spirit; but not a freer, self-representing earthman.

After this has been spoken, the other mystic who spoke before this last one appears again. This one now says the following:

I will now lead your soul through the Pillars of Hercules into the ancient Atlantic land. There you will see in soul pictures what you have experienced in your Atlantean incarnations, but which you have completely forgotten, while you have become accustomed to looking at earthly conditions in the way that was made possible for you by my opponent's influence. It was only in the post-Atlantean and final Atlantean periods that his influence became noticeably greater. Before that, mine prevailed in your soul. You were closer to my nature in the water-mist life than later. Thus you will be able to gauge from what entered your life at that time what he is to you; and what the spirit I serve can be to you. - For your perception at that time, wisdom spoke from all things and processes of the three realms of nature immersed in the water mist. At present, your soul only recognizes articulate, meaningful language from the mouths of humans. The source, the waves of water, the leaves of the forest trees swirling in the wind do not speak meaningful language. But they did in the ancient Atlantean times. And your soul was able to commune with all the beings of nature. It was still close to the “wisdom of the world” at the time of the test of humanity's ability to live in harmony with the water. And when the soul went within, when it withdrew its attention from what all things expressed, then, too, when man withdrew into solitude, where things did not speak, the soul heard a fundamental or intermediate tone that resounded through everything. When the soul heard this sound, then with the sound all the warmth of the world's existence streamed into it, and the light of the world-creative powers streamed into it. The soul was filled with the all-pervading wisdom. It said, intuitively sensing what was there: “The great spirit speaks.” The soul became devout and reverent when it felt the “great spirit” flowing within it. Thus spoke the great spirit......; and as in an echo, the soul spoke with the great spirit in adoration and worship;......; so was the dialogue of the soul with the great spirit in the old Atlantean times:...... ..... ..... Your soul has forgotten this dialogue; I have reminded her of it.

But now, through your journey through life on earth, you are gradually arriving at the place where the spirit was very close, which the other has been fighting since the beginning of time. I have placed this temple room in this place, which can only be reached through the depths of the soul. When the bandage is removed from your eyes, you will be surrounded by images that show your soul what surrounded you at the moment you stepped out of the spiritual world into an earthly incarnation for the first time. You will be able to “choose” again. When your soul chose for the first time, it incorporated into its developmental impulses those of my adversary. Thus the secrets of spiritual existence had to be veiled from it.

The person to be initiated is now led into the actual temple room, which is made completely dark at this moment. The Mystos, who serves the altar of the East, now speaks the words of consecration, which are intended to make the soul aware of the direction of its journey through space and time.

These words are followed by those which the soul should feel within itself in order to know how to feel correctly towards the essence of the first degree:

I vow and promise that I will keep myself in the spirit of the first occult degree without duplicity, weakness, or ambiguity, and that I will also keep myself in this spirit with respect to outsiders of this degree. Should I not conduct myself in the spirit of what I promise myself, then what I myself must then allow through full awareness will be fulfilled in my soul................³

The mystic serving the altar of the East continues:

You soul, bear in mind that you have left behind, at the gates of this room, everything that receives its value from the external world, in which my opponent also works with me. Here you can achieve nothing through all this; only your soul can work here, which makes use of nothing of all this for its work. What can serve you for work here is expressed in the symbolic garment that is now being put on you by my helpers.

The symbolic garment of the first degree is put on the person to be initiated.

In the completely dark room, a light is now lit. The mystos standing at the side of the one serving at the altar of the East receives this light in his hand and stands close in front of the person to be initiated. Behind him stands another designated mystos.

The mystos in the East speaks:

What is the soul seeking in this room?

The surrounding mystics answer in chorus:

The light of the spirit.

The mystic in the east says:

The light of the spirit will appear to this soul when it will penetrate through the right attitude into everything that speaks to it here.

In this moment, the mystic standing behind the person to be received removes the bandage from the eyes of the person to be received; the light only remains for moments; then it goes out of the mystic carrying it.

The person being initiated is in the completely dark room.

This is immediately followed by the opening ceremony associated with the lighting of the lights in the east, south and west. - - - ³

After this, the symbolic signs and words are explained and communicated, which the person to be initiated should become aware of in the sense of processes in the etheric body of man, so that he can feel himself to be a member of the first degree through their communication.

Then the person to be initiated is led before the altar of the East by two designated mystics. The mystic serving the East mimes the... sign; two mystics of the higher degrees join him; they cross their sword-like symbols above the forehead of the person to be initiated: the mystic of the East speaks:

In the name of the wise masters of the East and by the power with which I serve them, I inscribe you in the book of the first degree of those who strive for the light of eternal mysticism.

The candidate is led by the appointed mysts to the place assigned to him.

The ceremony is now interrupted and an instruction ceremony is inserted. During this, a teaching mystic imparts to the person to be initiated:

1. the legend, which interprets the evolution of humanity in symbolic terms.⁴

2. A sign of the occult writing.⁵

After this instruction, the ceremony is resumed to end with the same three symbolic conclusions that conclude all the ceremonies of the first degree.

• 1. The various dots in the text correspond to the original manuscript.
• 2. ..- = short-short-long.
• 3. See the explanation on page 245.
• 3. On page 153.
• 4. The Temple Legend
  According to Rudolf Steiner's lecture in Berlin on November 4, 1904, the legend goes back to Christian Rosenkreutz, the founder of Rosicrucianism in the 14th/15th century. However, he did not explain how the original Rosicrucian legend became the basis for the entire Freemasonry, but he did remark in his lecture Berlin, November 11, 1904, that Freemasonry had joined forces with the Rosicrucians. This probably also explains the term “Rosicrucian-Masons” in certain ritual texts by Rudolf Steiner.
  In Masonic literature, the origin of the Temple Legend is generally placed in the early 18th century because it first appeared in literature at that time. Although it is assumed that it must have been part of the ideas of Freemasonry at an earlier time, this has not been proven by documentation. There is no unequivocal version of the wording. In the various traditions, there are always variants.
  It first became known outside of Freemasonry in the 19th century, once through the literary adaptation by Gérard de Nerval (pseudonym for Gérard Labrunie, Paris 1828–1858), which appeared in mid-19th century in Paris and was translated into German by Manfred Krüger (“Die Geschichte der Königin aus dem Morgenland und von Soliman, dem Fürsten der Genien”, Stuttgart 1967), and by Charles William Heckethorn in his work “Secret Societies of all Ages and Countries”, London 1875, first German translation “Geheime Gesellschaften, Geheimbünde und Geheimlehren”, Leipzig 1900. The version contained in this work was used by Rudolf Steiner in the lectures of the volume “The Legend of the Temple and the Golden Legend” (GA 93).
  In 1923, in connection with the esoteric lessons for the “Wachsmuth-Lerchenfeld Group”, Rudolf Steiner suggested to the two participating writers Kurt Piper and Albert Steffen that they artistically interpret the legend. Before Rudolf Steiner's death (March 1925), Albert Steffen's drama “Hieram and Solomon” was created, in which he also incorporated parts of the Golden Legend. It was first published in 1925 in the weekly journal “Das Goetheanum”. In 1935, Marie Steiner's production of the play premiered on the stage of the Goetheanum; in 1937, it was performed at the World's Fair in Paris as a guest performance at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées. Kurt Piper created a cycle of poems based on the legend, “Kain und Abel-Seth. Mysterienlegende in 10 Tafeln am Grabe Rudolf Steiners”, published in the monthly journal “Die Drei” 6. Jg. 1926/27, 1. Heft.
• 5. A note from Marie Steiner reads: “Now it is my responsibility to communicate the sign, grip and word of the first degree. - The sign, grip and word are not only identifying marks; they not only have a deep symbolic meaning, but also a magical effect and magical value. An old masonic saying rightly says: To him who knows the sign, grip and word, the temple is built; but he who does not recognize them remains eternally blind in life.

Asuras remain behind on old Saturn. Satanic fire spirits on old Sun. The regent of fire spirits is Christ. Luciferic spirits fell behind on old Moon. Lucifer was at work in the Lemurian epoch, could be included in earth evolution, and worked as a liberator by giving men independence and enthusiasm for wisdom. Satanic Gods of hindrances began their work in the Atlantean epoch. Asuras are starting to work in the post-Atlantean epoch. They're the worst of the three and they mainly work into sexual life in the physical body. The many sexual aberrations today are to be ascribed to this strong influx. All forces of hindrances try to hold onto currently existing things that are still imperfect, carry them out and intensify them. Lucifers gave independence, egoity with egoism. Egoism, error and animal love are the first expressions of egoity, wisdom and highest spiritual love. We must bring about the respective transformations. The separation of the sexes took place in the third root race, it'll be overcome in the sixth root race; this must be prepared for in the sixth sub-race. Man's productive forces are becoming transformed. The productive force as such is the most sacred thing that we have, because it's directly divine. The more divine what we pull into the dirt is, the greater the sin. Later on the heart and larynx will be the productive organs in us. Just as the Word became flesh in Christ Jesus, so the flesh must become word when Christendom becomes perfected. That's the mystery of the Holy Grail, the holy love lance, the fertilizing sunlight that'll unite with Eva again. Rosicrucians' occult brotherhood is the seminary in which a human material must be educated for the coming age. A particularly bright light must always arise in especially dark times. Christ was born in the Oriphiel age. When Oriphiel rules again the spiritual light that was brought by Christian Rosenkreutz and is now being spread must have generated a host of clairvoyant men who are pioneers working consciously towards a goal. This will produce a separation into good and evil races. The fifth root race will perish through evil. Good and evil are still relatively undifferentiated and it's hard to see who's evil or good behind the flesh. When the forces of the masters and of the men who join them with their whole strength and will, and when the forces of the Gods of hindrances, Mammon, Satan, Asuras and their human followers intervene ever more mightily into human life and earth evolution, then good will develop into a divine good, and evil into a terrible Antichrist. Then every one of us needs world helpers and all the strength that he can only gain through the overcoming of suffering and evil. It's the aim of Theosophy and Rosicrucianism to summon men to this battle via such knowledge and to give them peace in the battle.

Where do these insights into the spiritual worlds come from and what is the path to them in the present day?

Dr. Steiner mentions four natural paths:

1. The entire world of dreams. First category.
2. Second category: presentiment, vision.
3. Second sight.
4. The Rosicrucian path.

A dream is the atavistic residue of an ancient state of consciousness, as it were.

Vision and presentiment lie in the subconscious.

Second sight does not enter consciousness either.

Present an example of presentiment, vision and deuteroscopy.

Immersing in water with consciousness from above.

Newspaper report

“Pester Lloyd”, 56th year, No. 130, Budapest, Thursday, June 3, 1909, morning edition, pp. 4-5

(Theosophical Congress in Budapest.) From Pentecost Sunday until today, the 5th European Theosophical Congress has been meeting here. It held its sessions in the ballroom of the Pest Lloyd Society. Numerous participants had come from England, France, Italy, Russia, Germany, the Netherlands and Bulgaria. The Hungarian Theosophical Society was represented by about eighty members. Numerous lectures were given on religious philosophy, occultism, pedagogy, aesthetics, etc. Pictures and drawings of a religious nature were exhibited in the ballroom. In particular, the pictures by Aladär Kriesch, Alexander Nagy, Robert Nädler and Bela v. Takäch were very well received. On Whit Monday evening, the congress members attended the performance of Madäch's “Tragedy of Man” at the National Theater. There were also two public lectures. On June 1, Madame Annie Besant gave a lecture in English on “The Extended Consciousness”. The convincing eloquence of the speakers made a lasting impression. Today's lecture by Dr. Rudolf Steiner pointed the way to the spiritual world. For the existence of such, the lecturer cited the clairvoyant consciousness, which manifests itself on the one hand in dreams, and on the other hand in presentiments, in visions and in other forms of spiritual perception. According to Dr. Steiner, dreams were originally a mediator of spiritual perceptions, but only later did they wither away into a world of unrealities. Visions and other states of clairvoyant consciousness are a return to the original spiritual world of perception, accompanied by images of the sensual world in which we live. Theosophy seeks to awaken the ability to enter the spiritual world with the ego consciousness that first arose through sensory perceptions, and to connect this ego consciousness with clairvoyance. Only in this way do the latter's perceptions become images of real processes, experiences and adventures. Once this ability has been awakened, man has reached a higher level of perfection, from which he can work for the real welfare and freedom of humanity.

The lecture was listened to with great interest by the numerous audience and rewarded with abundant applause. The foreign Theosophists were charmed by the beauties of Budapest and by Hungarian hospitality; they left our midst as enthusiastic friends of Hungary.

Christian initiation has existed since the founding of Christianity. Through the Middle Ages and in our own time it has remained the same among a number of religious Orders as well as among the Rosicrucians. It consists of a spiritual training which culminates in certain identical and invariable symptoms. The Brotherhoods where, in profound secrecy, this training used to be given, are the home of all spiritual life and religious progress.

In certain respects the Christian initiation is more difficult of attainment than the initiation of ancient times. It is bound up with the essence and mission of Christianity which came into the world at a time when man had descended most deeply into matter. This descent was to imbue him with a new consciousness, but the struggle involved in rising from the depths of materialism demands greater effort and renders initiation more difficult. That is why the Christian masters demand intense humility and devotion of their pupils.

The Christian initiation has always consisted of seven stages, four of which correspond to four of the Stations of Calvary. The stages are:—

1. The Washing of the Feet
2. The Scourging
3. The Crowning with Thorns
4. The Bearing of the Cross
5. The Mystic Death
6. The Entombment
7. The Resurrection

The Washing of the Feet is a preparatory exercise of a moral character, relating to the scene where Christ washes the feet of the disciples before the Easter Festival (St. John 13): “Verity, verily I say unto you, the servant is not greater than his Lord; neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him.” Theology gives a purely moral interpretation to this act and looks upon it merely as an example of the profound humility and devotion of the Master to His disciples and His work. The Rosicrucians also held this view but in a deeper sense, relating the story to the evolution of all beings in Nature. The scene is really an allusion to the law that the higher is a product of the lower. The plant might say to the mineral: I am above you since I have a life which you have not; yet without you I could not exist, for the substances which nourish me are drawn from you. The animal again might say to the plant: I am above you, for I have feeling, desires, the capacity for voluntary movement which you have not; but without the food which you provide, without your leaves and fruits I could not live. And man should say to the plants: I am above you, but to you I owe the oxygen which I breathe. To the animals he should say: I have a soul and you have not; yet we are brothers and companions, involved in the great process of evolution. The esoteric meaning of the Washing of the Feet is that Jesus the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God, could not exist without the Apostles.

The neophyte who meditates on this theme for months and years has a vision of the Washing of the Feet in the astral world during sleep. Then he is ready to pass to the second stage of the Christian initiation.

The Scourging,—At this stage man learns to resist the scourgings of life. Life brings sufferings of all kinds—physical, moral, intellectual, spiritual. Life is felt to be a dreadful and incessant torture. The disciple must endure it with perfect equanimity of soul and heroic courage. He must cease to know physical or moral fear. When he has become fearless, he sees, in dream, the scene of the Scourging. In another vision he sees himself in the Christ Who is scourged. Certain symptoms in physical life accompany this event. There is an intensification of the life of feeling, a wider sense of life and of love. We have an example of heightened sensibility transferred to the world of intelligence, in the life of Goethe. After lengthy osteological studies of the skeleton of man and of the animals, as well as comparative embryological research, Goethe came to the conclusion that the intermaxillary bone must exist in man. Before his time, science denied the existence of this bone in the upper jaw of man. Goethe himself says that he was overcome with joy and a kind of ecstasy when he actually discovered the intermaxillary bone in the human jaw, adding that it was one of the most wonderful experiences of his life. During his Italian journey he again had the same experience. He was looking at a fragment of a sheep's skull, and another idea came to him—an idea still more significant in regard to human evolution—that the human brain, the seat of intelligence, the centre of voluntary movements, is a development and a metamorphosis of the spinal marrow, just as the flower is a culmination and synthesis of root and stem. What faculty was it that enabled Goethe to make these marvelous discoveries which by themselves deserve to make his name immortal? It was his sublime intelligence on the one hand, but also his intense sympathy with all living beings and the whole of Nature. Such sensitiveness is a refinement and an extension of the forces of life and love. It corresponds to the second stage of Christian initiation and is the recompense for the trial of the Scourging. Man acquires a feeling of love for all beings and this gives him a sense of living in the heart of Nature herself.

The Crowning with Thorns,—At this stage man must learn to brave the world morally and intellectually, to desist from anger when all that is most dear to him is being attacked. The capacity to remain aloof when everything is tumbling about our ears, to say “Yea” when the rest of the world says “Nay”—that is what must be acquired before the next step can be taken. This gives rise to a new symptom, namely a dissociation, or rather the power of a momentary dissociation of three faculties which, in man, are united: the faculties of willing, feeling and thinking. We must learn to separate and to re-unite them at will. So long, for example, as some outer event carries us away with uncontrolled enthusiasm, we are immature, for such enthusiasm comes from the event, not from ourselves, and we may even exercise a shattering influence of which we are not master.

The enthusiasm of the disciple must have its well-spring in the depths of his inner life. He must therefore be able to remain impassive in the face of any event, no matter how catastrophic. That is the only way to reach freedom. The dissociation of feeling, thinking and willing produces in the brain a change that is symbolised by the Crown of Thorns. If this test is to be passed without danger, the powers inherent in the personality must be sufficiently intense and in perfect equilibrium. If the disciple has not reached this stage, or if he receives wrong guidance, the change in the brain may lead to insanity. Insanity is nothing but an involuntary separation of these faculties without the possibility of their re-union by dint of the inner will. The disciple brings about the separation by an act of conscious volition. A flash of his will re-establishes the link between the organs and the activities of soul. In the lunatic, the cleft may be incurable and produce a physical lesion in the nerve-centres.

In the course of the stage in the Christian initiation known as the Crowning with Thorns, there arises the phenomenon known as the Guardian of the Threshold—the appearance of the lower double of man. The spiritual being of man, composed of his impulses of will, his desires and his thoughts, appears to the Initiate in visible form. It is a form that is sometimes repugnant and terrible, for it is the offspring of his good and bad desires and of his karma—it is their personification in the astral world, the Evil Pilot of the Egyptian Book of the Dead. This form must be conquered by man before he can find the higher Self. The Guardian of the Threshold which has been a phenomenon of astral vision from times immemorial, is the origin of all the myths concerning the struggles of Heroes with monsters, of Perseus and Hercules with the Hydra, of St. George and Siegfried with the dragon.

The premature appearance of the astral world and the sudden apparition of the Double or Guardian of the Threshold may lead a man who is not fully prepared or who has not taken all the precautions necessary for the disciple, to madness and insanity.

The Bearing of the Cross refers, symbolically, to a virtue of the soul. This virtue which consists in a sense of having ‘the world on one's conscience’ as Atlas bore the world on his shoulders, may be called a feeling of indentification with the whole Earth, or in the words of oriental occultism the cessation of the feeling of separateness.

In general, and above all in modern times, men identify themselves with the body. (In his Ethics, Spinoza says that the basic and fundamental idea of man is the idea of the body in action.) The disciple must cultivate the idea that in the sum-total of things, his body in itself is of no more importance than any other body, whether it be the body of an animal, a table or a piece of marble. The self is not bounded by the skin; it is united with the great organism of the universe as the hand is united with the rest of the body. The hand alone would be as dust and ashes. What would the body of man be without the soil on which he rests, without the air he breathes? It would die, for it is but a tiny organ of the Earth and the air. That is why the disciple must sink himself in every other being and identify himself with the Spirit of the Earth.

Goethe has given a marvelous description of this stage at the beginning of Faust. The Spirit of the Earth to whom Faust aspires, appears before him and speaks these words:

“In the tides of life, in Action's storm,
A fluctuant wave,
A shuttle free,
Birth and the Grave,
An eternal sea,
A weaving, flowing
Life, all-glowing;

Thus at Time's humming loom 'tis my hand prepares
The garments of Life which the Divinity weaves.”

To identify oneself with all beings does not mean that the body is to be despised. It must be borne as some exterior object, even as Christ bore His Cross. The Spirit must wield the body as the hand wields the hammer. At this stage the disciple is conscious of the occult powers lying latent in his body. In the course of his meditations, the stigmata may even appear on his skin. This is the sign that he is ripe for the fifth stage, where, in sudden illumination, the Mystic Death is revealed to him.

The Mystic Death,—In the grip of the greatest of all suffering the disciple recognises that the world of the senses is illusion. He is actually aware of death and of descending into the world of shades, but then the darkness breaks and a new light—the astral light—shines out. The veil of the temple is ‘rent in twain.’ This light has nothing in common with the physical light of the sun. It rays forth from the inner being of man. The impression it makes is wholly unlike that made by outer light. The following comparison will give us some idea of what is meant. We imagine that we are leaving a turbulent city behind us and entering a dense forest. The noises gradually cease and the silence becomes complete. We finally begin to be aware of what lies beyond the silence, to pass the zero point at which all external sound has ceased. And now sound arises again for the inner ear from the other side of existence. Such is the experience of the soul of one who enters the astral world. He is then in contact with the inverse quality of the things with which he was familiar, just as in arithmetic, beneath the zero point, we enter into the growing series of negative numbers.

Thus do we need to lose all in order to regain all, and this applies to our own existence. In the moment of losing all we appear to die to ourselves and it is in the world around us that we begin to live again.

Such is the Mystic Death. When a man has passed this stage, the time has come for the next:

The Entombment,—Man feels that he is freed from his own body and is one with the planet. He is one with the Earth and finds himself again within the planetary life.

The Resurrection,—This is a sublime experience, impossible of description unless it be within the walls of the sanctuary. The last stage of Christian initiation transcends all words and all analogy fails. At this stage man acquires the power of healing. Yet it must be realised that he who possesses it, possesses at the same time the inverse power to bring about disease. The negative invariably goes in hand with the positive. Hence the tremendous responsibility attaching to this power which may be characterised by the saying: The creative word issues from the soul aflame.

We cannot discuss everything that could be said in connection with the Apocalypse, for then we would have to speak for years. In these lectures we can only give a kind of sketch, and some explanations that can help us understand this mighty work. Today we would still like to point out some particularly important things. We begin by returning to a specific question of human evolution.

Every age between the Atlantean catastrophe and the great war of all against all has its own unique task for our development. In a new incarnation a human being never has the same task as in the last one. From incarnation to incarnation new tasks approach us, and so this post-Atlantean evolutionary age has worked on human beings in a special way. The whole epoch of earth evolution exists to make human beings fit particularly to develop the human I. In the last third of the Atlantean age, human beings were first equipped to draw the I toward the physical head. That is, the I, the spiritual basis for the experience of self that was only like a seed at the time, was pulled “down” toward the physical body, specifically, toward the human head. But the most significant impulse to have an effect on the I came through the event of Golgotha. All the preceding epochs had already worked in that direction. When we look back at the last third of Atlantean evolution we see that a certain point in the etheric head and the physical head did not then coincide, whereas today the etheric body of the head is approximately the same as the physical head. Because of this, human beings gradually came to develop their I, their sense of self. The rest of Atlantean evolution was used to make the human being fit to be a proper bearer of the I. Even at the end of Atlantean culture the brain was entirely soft, more or less like that of a hydrocephalic today, as part of an atavistic inheritance. The physical brain could only become firm enough through the arrival of the etheric brain. Still, even when the etheric head had fully entered the physical head in the ancient Indian age, it was not yet possible for this head to be a perfect bearer of the I. For this reason the ancient Indians longed for the spiritual world and had to be educated so that the I could gradually develop in them.

To begin with, the human being consists of the four members: physical body, etheric body, astral body, and the I. However, if we wish to investigate post-Atlantean evolution more precisely, we must also consider the ninefold aspect of the human being. This is the difference between the oriental and the northern mystery teachings. The I works to transform the astral body into manas or spirit-self, the etheric body into budhi or life-spirit, and the physical body, through breathing, into atma. In other words, the I transforms the astral body, the etheric body, and the physical body. But before this can happen consciously, it must have taken place through higher beings.

Today the conscious transformation of these members occurs only in schools of initiation. For example, in the last third of the Atlantean age the physical body was transformed to the point that it could be a bearer of an I, but this occurred unconsciously. What was transformed in the astral body is called sentient soul, the etheric body transformed in this way is called the intellectual soul, and the physical body thus unconsciously transformed is the consciousness soul. And only when human beings have developed the consciousness soul can the spirit-self gradually—and at first, unconsciously—be woven into them.

In the cultural epochs of our earth evolution, manas is gradually being formed and slipped into the astral body. After it has been prepared in the last third of the Atlantean age, the consciousness soul must again be transformed by the Yahweh-Christ principle in the next cultural epoch.

In the ancient Indian age the etheric body was permeated by the I, which by then had moved into the human being. In the ancient Persian age the astral body was permeated by the I, in the Egyptian age the I permeated the sentient soul; in the Greco-Latin age the intellectual soul was permeated by the I, in our culture, the I permeates the consciousness soul. In the age of “Philadelphia” the I will permeate the spirit-self, or manas. Then the human beings who, through theosophical-spiritual teachings, have made themselves capable of recognizing Christ will be in a position to see him in a new form of existence—in his delicate etheric body—for he will come again.

The I will be educated through wisdom, through Theosophy, so that it receives manas or spirit-self and will be able to recognize Christ again. Theosophical teachings have been given to humankind not in order to agitate for Theosophy but rather because they were necessary.

In the age represented by the seven seals something like a shower of meteorites will occur, caused by increasing materialism, and some human beings will ascend to a spiritual state. What the spiritualized human beings have acquired through their efforts in our post-Atlantean age will completely permeate them within. When, in the age of the sixth seal, everything that the human being has in terms of sentient soul, intellectual soul, and consciousness soul has been worked into the other members, human beings will have achieved the ability to create an external imprint of their inner life in their gesture, features, in their whole life. Because they have worked on their development they will be able, in the fourth, fifth, and sixth ages in the epoch of the seals, to use these three soul forces—the sentient, intellectual, and consciousness souls—to permeate and work on themselves in order to take in manas.

When the human being has gone through a cycle fully, so that nothing more remains to be done, this is characterized in occultism with a “0” or zero. Therefore, human beings will have permeated the three with four. For the next age, this permeation of the three with the four is expressed by multiplying three by four; they have gone through three cycles, that is through three zeros. This is expressed thus: twelve with three zeros: 12,000. “Then I saw another angel ascend from the rising of the sun, with the seal of the living God, and he called with a loud voice to the four angels who had been given power to harm earth and sea, saying, ‘Do not harn the earth or the sea or the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God upon their foreheads.’ And I heard the number of the sealed, one hundred and forty-four thousand sealed, out of every tribe of the sons of Israel, twelve thousand sealed out of the tribe of Judah, twelve thousand of the tribe of Reuben ...” (Rev. 7:2–5) Then the various groups of people who have matured will be united in the community of Philadelphia for mature brotherhood when every soul will feel for others. All those who have been separated out of the various groups can now be multiplied together because they will live within one another. Their life together will be such that they will not disturb one another, such that one soul will work into another soul in complete harmony. Twelve times 12,000 gives the number 144,000.

These are the people who will constitute human society in the age of the sixth seal. The writer of the Apocalypse knows the secrets of all evolution, and he tells them in a language generally little understood. He does this because human beings will be able to develop their consciousness soul precisely through the exertion of energy required to penetrate such riddles. What today is presented as Theosophy is appropriate for the present age. In later ages an entirely different form of wisdom will be given. The souls who are preparing themselves by taking in Theosophy will take in new forms of wisdom in the next age. What is exoteric culture today was mystery wisdom in ancient times.

In all the ancient mysteries there was a last stage wherein the student experienced the mystery of Golgotha. Therefore, the coffin in which the student experienced the crucifixion, the laying in the grave—and out of which, experienced the resurrection—this coffin was given the shape of the cross. Since the mystery of Golgotha, this fact has become exoteric.

The conservative attitude has always been opposed to making the esoteric exoteric. Hence, Christ was seen as someone who makes the esoteric manifest. But when the time for it has come, the esoteric must always be made manifest. Had we been able to follow the writer of the Apocalypse to the place where he spoke to his disciples, we would be able to hear what is spoken to us today.

In the age when the sixth seal is broken the “people of twelve” will appear. The salvation of the “great whore of Babylon” will also occur in the sixth age. In this sixth age the earth will have repeated the Saturn, Sun, and Moon stages, as well as the earth condition itself and Jupiter-Earth. On Venus-Earth the earth will finally have the five rounds behind it. Then the sixth state will have come. Nevertheless, the Vulcan state for the chosen will not be present yet. For this reason we read [“And there are seven kings: five are fallen, and one is, and the other is not yet come ...”] “... five are fallen ...” and the remnant that has maintained itself: “... one is ...” and the seventh: “the other has not yet come.” (Rev. 17:10) We see how we again find the messages of the writer of the Apocalypse in Theosophy.

But those who have proven themselves to be immature in the age of Venus-Earth, who have placed themselves under the rulership of Sorat, must now isolate themselves on a special sphere of earth while the other seven proceed downward and again upward. Thus the colony of Sorat falls away. The black magicians inhabit this eighth sphere, which goes to the left and away, and the beast gives a home to all that thus falls away: that is the eighth state. In this way we can find all the teachings of Theosophy in the Apocalypse.

The more humanity advances, the more energy is necessary in order to spiritualize those who have been left behind. For this reason those who are the most deeply initiated, Moses and Elijah, are called. Powerful forces are needed. Because they were already deeply initiated, they will be able in that distant future to stand so high that they will be able to work in a very special way. However, karma is a law to which all are subject; therefore, those who were initiated before the event of Golgotha must make up for the following.

The three and a half days required for initiation in ancient times were lost days in the initiates' development. Initiates had to leave their bodies during these three and a half days. Therefore, the I could not work on the transformation of its physical body, its etheric body, and its astral body. For this reason, in the future they must leave their physical body to the external world for three and a half days. Hence, we read, “For three days and a half ... gaze at their dead bodies.” (Rev. 11:9) Even the deeds that are sacrifices for humanity must find their cosmic compensation.

In this way spiritual seers have spoken to other spiritual seers through the millennia and we find all of this again even unto the names in the Apocalypse. As Paul said, “... it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” (Gal. 2:20) This, too, we find again in the Apocalypse. The I is permeated by Christ. The one who can fructify the I with his name is the Christ: “... and he has a name inscribed which no one knows but he himself.” (Rev. 19:12)

We are also told that the earth will be spiritualized in the New Jerusalem. There will be no external sun present then; the corresponding spiritual beings will provide the light. We read, “And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine upon it ...” (Rev. 21:23)

The writer of the Apocalypse always shows the evolution of humankind in pictures. He sees the leader who was first proclaimed as Vishva Karman, and then as Ahura Mazdao, and he points to him, to Christ.

In order to illuminate what is found in the Apocalypse, we must refer to the transformation of organs that are developed in human beings into other forms. They now have the ability to change their forms.

The heart muscle is distinguished from other muscles under our voluntary control by the fact that the heart is an involuntary muscle, and yet is striated in the same way as voluntary muscle. The heart is on the way to becoming an organ with entirely different functions. We see this indicated in the structure of the muscle.

What comes forth from the voice box will become increasingly powerful. What we speak forth in order to express our thoughts shapes the air—already now it forms it according to how we think. But the word will become increasingly powerful. One day the human being will create the human being's equal through the word that comes forth from the larynx. The one who has the sword coming forth from his mouth is an indication of the being who is the alpha and the omega.

The lamb, who will be the lord over the lower nature, forms one of the seals. Sorat is as if expelled in the eighth sphere by the woman who shows us another seal of the Rosicrucian. The seer can also see this in the spiritual world. In this way, these Rosicrucian seals have an awakening effect when we meditate upon them with understanding.

We have seen how we must understand ancient religious texts literally, taking them at their word. Theosophy is the only possible commentary for the Apocalypse and it should prepare the community of Philadelphia. It is therefore within the plan for the evolution of the earth that Theosophy exists. Therefore, at various locations on the earth, great individualities are at work to give Theosophy to those able to receive it.

Notes by Alice Kinkel, first degree

The first prayer distinguishes us from all other such endeavors, which are based on documents or on a traditional wisdom. We do not refer to anything like that, we only tie in with the work that has been done, with what has actually been achieved.

In the near future, among other things that will be undertaken against us, our occult movement will also be tried to be suspected and vilified, so we should know this, to which we are joining.

In the spiritual realm, a community like ours exists, but it has only as much justification as souls profess it as the truth. And if someone does not like something about it, they do not need to be part of it. We do not claim to be an order, a Rosicrucian movement or anything of the kind, but our aim is to represent the truth in such a way that we do not claim wisdom as our own, but we do want to appropriate the work that has flowed from it as wisdom.

Wisdom is there; there was an ancient wisdom treasure of humanity, as shown in the “Guardian of the Threshold” by the Grand Master. And how one has to relate to this, that is, how one advances in the occult life, is shown to us by Maria in the second scene with Thomasius. It would be more convenient to give a prescription for all, but it had to be shown in our Western movement how people of the special kind of Thomasius, Strader, Capesius and Maria go the initiation way.

“Compasses and Rule” means: We adopt your customs. Such prayers contain in words everything we need, as do the Mystery Dramas of Dr. Steiner. Every word is there in its place and full of occult meaning. Nothing, nothing is set and said for a reason other than its spiritual meaning and power, as it is.

The opponents of spirituality, such as Haeckel, carry their spiritual darkness deeply hidden within themselves and their rage and anger is actually directed against themselves. Because they cannot access their deepest soul life in life, they show themselves quite differently towards spirituality after death and are most easily summoned, for example, in spiritualistic séances.

Nietzsche is very interesting in this respect; he found it difficult to let go of his material side and that is why he presented such a strange picture to the seer during his illness. The man Nietzsche, this strange personality, lying on the sofa and the aura around him. The split in the ego comes to expression in such personalities; while the consciousness is materialistic, the subconscious is spiritual.

“Brethren of the Future…” – We have no name either, because Lucifer is the patron of every external foundation of an association or society.

Upon admission to the first degree, it is also said: The sign of the first degree will be the expression in the future of self-knowledge or of what is understood by “know thyself”.

The contents of this book are selected from the matter of Rudolf Steiner's Esoteric School. The School remained in existence for ten years from 1904 to 1914, when the outbreak of the First World War prevented its continuance. During that period Rudolf Steiner was still within the Theosophical Society, and he used the words `theosophy' and `theosophical', though always (as he tells us in his Autobiography) in the direction in which his anthroposophical spiritual science had from the first been pointing. After the lapse of a further ten years, when he went on to found the General Anthroposophical Society and himself became its President, his esoteric guidance of those members who sought it was continued on a somewhat different footing, in closer association with the organization and direction of the Society.

The institution of the Esoteric School in 1904 had been quickly followed by publishing descriptions of the path which pupils should follow, in the book Theosophy, in the series of Essays, Knowledge of the Higher Worlds. How is it achieved? (first published in book form in 1909), and also in Occult Science: an Outline, which appeared early in 1910. A description of the basic conditions for inner development, particularly of the `subsidiary exercises', is also to be found in these books, and after their publication Rudolf Steiner sometimes alluded to such exercises by reference to them. In Chapter V of Occult Science: an Outline (`Knowledge of Higher Worlds. Concerning Initiation') he lays down as follows the necessary precondition for all the exercises.

We can however understand from this how necessary it is that man should not demand entry into the spiritual world until he has learned and understood certain essential truths of that world by the simple exercise of his everyday intelligence, developed in the physical world. If spiritual development follows the right and normal path, then before he aspires to enter the supersensible world the pupil will already have mastered with his ordinary intelligence the whole of the earlier contents of this book.

In 1947, thirty-three years after the First World War had interrupted the Esoteric School and two years after the end of the Second, Marie Steiner, in response to requests from members of the Anthroposophical Society, set about publishing the most important of the Contents of the Esoteric School. Numerous works on oriental training methods (Yoga etc.) were making their appearance, and it was her object to set against these something from the European discipline of Rudolf Steiner. `By making available', she wrote in a letter, `examples of Rudolf Steiner's careful, personally-delivered advice, I wished to ensure that something could come forth from that Rosicrucian stream which is more in tune with the present age than decadent Indian and Tibetan methods.'

Three separate series of selections in English translation, entitled From the Contents of the Esoteric School, have previously appeared in 1948, 1949 and 1954. The following includes a revised translation of all that they contain together with some additional material not previously published in English.

O.B.

This English edition is based on the 1998 edition of the German edition of GA 97.

The lectures given in 1906 and 1907, notes and records of which are collected in this volume, were given at the same time as the lectures given in Berlin and published in the volume Original impulses for the science of the spirit (GA 96), and may thus be said to complement them. All these lectures were given for members of the then German Section of the Theosophical Society. The lecture on Wagner's Parsifal in Landin was given because Rudolf Steiner, Marie Steiner-von Sivers and some friends had been at Eugenie von Bredow's country estate for a short holiday and then seen Parsifal performed in Bayreuth at the invitation of Sophie Stinde and Pauline von Kalkreuth, the two leaders of the Munich branch.

Rather than follow the usual chronological order, the lectures have been organized under four major themes in this volume. In 13 lectures, Rudolf Steiner considered the spiritual content of the truths to be found in the Christian revelation; 3 lectures are on the nature and mission of the luciferic spirits, 5 on the Rosicrucian way of initiation and its specific nature compared to earlier ways. The fourth group are lectures, some of which were given to central anthroposophical insights, others in their application in different spheres of life.

The terms ‘theosophy’ and ‘theosophical’. At the time when he gave these lectures, Rudolf Steiner's anthroposophical spirit of the science was still within the context of the Theosophical Society and he would generally use the terminology familiar to its members. Yet from the very beginning he used the terms ‘theosophy’ and ‘theosophical’ with reference to his own independent spiritual researches. Taking up a suggestion he made at a later date, the terms have been replaced with ‘science of the spirit’ and ‘anthroposophy’ in these lectures except where they refer specifically to H. P. Blavatsky's theosophical stream. This is the case in the lectures given in Dusseldorf on 4 April 1906 and in Leipzig on 25 April 1906 and 12 January 1907.

For a glossary of repeatedly used Indian theosophical terms, see next chapter.

Sources. The lecture notes were made by members of the audience, some being better, others less good. Only 3 lectures (Basel, 19 September 1906; Karlsruhe, 4 February 1907, and Vienna, 22 February 1907) were taken down verbatim. All others are based on brief notes or summaries. The extremely brief record of the Parsifal lecture given in Landin has been extended by using Marie Steiner's notes. Although the sources were on the whole not very satisfactory, the lectures notes have been included in Rudolf Steiner's collected works because they give an idea of his lecturing activities at that time. They often complement each other, also with regard to important details.

For the 1998 German edition, the notes were revised and an index of names added. Text revision by Maria Balastèr and Ulla Trapp.

The volume was given its title by the editor of the first edition. The titles given to individual lectures are not by Rudolf Steiner.

Previously published lecture from this volume: The Structure of the Lords Prayer (Karlsruhe 4 February 1907. Tr. A. H. Parker. London: Rudolf Steiner Press 1971.