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The Rudolf Steiner Archive

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Search results 691 through 700 of 2237

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105. Universe, Earth and Man: Lecture IV 07 Aug 1908, Stuttgart
Translated by Harry Collison

Rudolf Steiner
Only the germ of man dwelt in this globe, as yet he had no ego; but all those Spiritual Beings who already had a certain degree of development behind them were intimately connected with this nebula.
The physical body was not so dense as it is now, it was more etheric and finer, and the ego was not yet formed. Now, through the sun shining upon the earth from outside, and the sun-beings also working on it from outside, conditions on earth became completely changed.
You can easily understand that sight is connected with ego-consciousness, for as long as one cannot perceive an outer world one is not an ego. Therefore the first flash of ego-consciousness coincided with the first opening of man's eyes to external objects.
143. Experiences of the Supernatural: The Human Soul's Activities in the Course of Time 14 Jan 1912, Winterthur

Rudolf Steiner
Of these four members, the outer world only knows the physical body, and of course everyone is free to deny that there is such a thing as an ether body or an astral body or the I. One can say: Everyone speaks of the ego; but it is still refuted. The ego is like a kind of flame that is consumed by the fuel of the physical body like a wick. — This is how they wanted to refute the philosopher Bergson, who refers to the persistence of the ego. But we can see how the ego survives individual perceptions. Every day shows this, since every night the ego is extinguished and cannot be experienced as something that continues uninterruptedly.
If you pay attention to such things, you will soon notice that emotions are a greater hindrance than perceptions when going to sleep, and especially emotions that are related to the most intense interests of the ego. If a person is anticipating a particular event, they often won't sleep for weeks. Just try it: an event that is bound to occur with a certain degree of certainty, for example the appearance of a comet – if you are not an astronomer who has an ego interest in it – will keep you awake quite well.
219. Man and the World of Stars: The Mysteries of Man's Nature and the Course of the Year 24 Dec 1922, Dornach
Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond

Rudolf Steiner
Man knew that he can only comprehend the deepest essence of his Ego when he listens to the secrets projected by the Cosmic Word, the Cosmic Logos, into everything that takes place in Nature at the time when the Earth is swathed in her mantle of snow and when life around and on the Earth is contracted by cold.
And more and more it came about in those ancient times that when the Initiates pointed to the Sun at the Midnight Hour in the depth of Winter, they were obliged to make known to their pupils that man on Earth feels his Ego deserted and forsaken in a certain way. The festival of Midwinter became for those possessed of the greatest knowledge more and more a festival of sadness and mourning through which it was to be brought home to man that within earthly existence he cannot find the way to his Ego, that he must learn from what is to be read in the signs written by the Logos on the Earth in Midwinter, how he with his Ego had been forsaken by the Cosmos. For it was the Earth alone of which he was aware at this time, and that for which the Ego yearns—the power of the Sun—was covered by the Earth. The Sun did indeed appear at the Midnight Hour, but man felt that the strength which would enable him to reach the Sun-Being was continually waning.
346. Lectures to Priests The Apocalypse: Lecture XI 15 Sep 1924, Dornach
Translator Unknown

Rudolf Steiner
You must understand how mediums get into this condition. Someone is a medium if his ego and astral body are pulled out of his physical and etheric bodies by an external force, and this was also what happened at the time of the Babylonian priests.
The other ones walk around like men, but their fate is that their human ego is not in them, so that one can no longer speak of them as human beings, for they are possessed by the beast and the false prophet.
For the first stage, the Babylonian stage, will have straying human beings who have drawn an aberration into themselves through their physical constitution, so that there is no hope that anything particularly good will become of these walking human bodies over which the ego and astral body have entirely lost control. These bodies must be given up for lost although perhaps not the ego and astral body which belong to them.
68c. The Story of the Green Serpent and the Beautiful Lily: Lecture Two 27 Nov 1904, Cologne
Translator Unknown

Rudolf Steiner
For if wisdom is brought into the uncleansed passions, they become fanatical; and a man then remains the slave of his lower ego. The ascent from Kama to Mana is dangerous, unless at the same time the lower ego is sacrificed. With reference to this Goethe says in his “Westöstlichen Divan”, Book 4, Page 17 “Und so lang du das nicht hast Dieses Stirb and Werde Bist du nur ein trülber Gast Auf der dunklen Erde.”
The Will of the Wisps are still in Ahamkara, the slaves of the lower Ego. This wisdom cannot endure. The soul-life must be purified slowly and must ascend slowly. The Will of the Wisps scatter their gold about in the meadow.
The Giant can make a bridge across, but when the Sun is at its highest point, the Serpent can do so too; when through the radiant Sun of knowledge man raises his Ego to the Divine. In the sacred moments of life, at the moments of the complete blotting out of self, man unites himself with the Godhead.
99. Theosophy of the Rosicrucian: Man's Communal Life Between Death and a New Birth. Birth into the Physical World 29 May 1907, Munich
Translated by Mabel Cotterell, Dorothy S. Osmond

Rudolf Steiner
According to the way and manner in which he has developed his astral body, he is drawn to the mother; the essence, the substance, the Organisation of the astral body draws him to the mother. The ego draws him to the father. The ego was present even in ages of remote antiquity, when the soul descended for the first time from the bosom of the Godhead into an earthly body. This ego has developed through many incarnations; the ego, the “I,” of one human being is distinct from the ego of another and at the present stage of evolution gives rise to the force of attraction to the father.
It may happen that the astral body is attracted to a mother but that the ego is not attracted to the corresponding father; in such a case the wandering continues until suitable parents are found.
68b. The Circular Flow of Man's Life within the World Of Sense, Soul And Spirit: The Riddle of Existence 05 Feb 1907, Basel

Rudolf Steiner
When asleep, only the physical body and the etheric body of the sleeper lie in bed; however, the astral body and the ego are loosened. Instincts, desires and passions, feelings and sensations sink down into unconscious darkness during sleep.
Then the moment also arrives when those parts of the astral body dissolve that have not been processed by the ego. Now comes a fact that can be proved just as logically as any biological law, but which few people think about properly and thoroughly, namely that the human, immortal individuality, consisting of the ego and the life essence, finds a new opportunity to enter this earthly life.
More and more we should strive to take as much as possible of the imperishable with us into the superphysical realm. The ego core goes through many lives of man and rises ever higher to God. Originally, the soul also comes from divinity.
26. Anthroposophical Leading Thoughts: Michaels Mission in the Cosmic Age of Human Freedom
Translated by George Adams, Mary Adams

Rudolf Steiner
[ 5 ] What man experiences through this his environment which is but the accomplished Work of the Divine and Spiritual, must take effect on his spiritual nature (i.e. his Ego) only. His physical and etheric Organisation must only be affected by that which flows on, in the stream of evolution, not in his outer environment, but within his own being, and which had its origin in the Being and Manifestation of the Divine-Spiritual.
This ‘holding at a distance’ is taking place in the sub-consciousness, when in the consciousness there are the forces which represent the life of the Ego in freedom. For the inward perception of man himself there is the consciousness of his activity in freedom, but for the spiritual Beings connected with man from other spheres of the Universe it is different.
The primeval Light appears again in the Light brought by Christ to the human ego. In the life in union with Christ this blissful thought may shine like a sun through the whole soul: ‘The glorious primal Divine Light is here again; it shines, although its light comes not from Nature.’
197. Polarities in the Evolution of Mankind: Lecture XI 22 Nov 1920, Stuttgart
Translator Unknown

Rudolf Steiner
The life body relates to the Ancient Sun, the astral body to the Ancient Moon, and the principle we call our I or ego relates essentially to the earth as it is at present. What do we mean when we say that we relate to the ego we bear to the present earth?
As human beings we are part of this earth and our mission is in the first place to achieve full ego development; to some extent we have already developed it. The forces of the earth, the intrinsic nature of the earth, served as our guide in developing the ego to the extent to which we have now developed it.
Let us be clear about this: The earth has encouraged us to develop the ego. In its decline it will still be encouraging us to develop the ego yet further. This earth is something we shall have to leave behind in order to continue evolution on Jupiter and so on.
77a. The Task of Anthroposophy in the Context of Science and Life: Knowledge of Nature and Knowledge of the Mind 27 Jul 1921, Darmstadt

Rudolf Steiner
But we will not be able to deny it: the dream realm represents that in which our ego, so to speak, loses itself again. It goes so far that we experience in our dreams what can only come from our own ego as if it were coming from an alien ego. The dream dissolves our ego, so to speak, as the chaotic manifestation of our soul life, our soul life that is not initially connected to the outside world.
The aim of the spiritual-scientific method is to prevent the ego from fluttering, to enable the development of soul and spiritual activity in a healthy and not in an unhealthy way.

Results 691 through 700 of 2237

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