Rosicrucianism and Modern Initiation
GA 233a
These lectures, given just after the Christmas Foundation Meeting, describe the changes in the inner life and consciousness of western people since the 9th century. Formerly there was an awareness of the spiritual within all realms of nature, but this disappeared and was replaced by the modern consciousness of the sense world alone.
This book contains six lectures given by Rudolf Steiner at Dornach, Switzerland, in January of 1924. They are from the volume: Mystery Sites of the Middle Ages, published in German as: Mysterienstaetten des Mittelalters. Rosenkreutzertum und modernes Einweihungsprinzip. Das Osterfest als ein Stueck Mysteriengeschichte der Menschheit. The translator is Mary Adams.
| I. | Research into the Life of the Spirit During the Middle Ages | January 04, 1924 |
| Inward experience of Ideas during the ninth, tenth and eleventh centuries. Change from the experience of spiritual beings to an experience of the natural elements only without the spiritual in them. | ||
| II. | Hidden Centres of the Mysteries in the Middle Ages | January 05, 1924 |
| An example of Rosicrucian initiation in early middle ages (Raimundus Lullus). The experience of the mountain — astral body expansion — leads to an encounter with the spirit of the youth (religious revelation), the experience of the cave — compression of the astral body — leads to the experience of the spirit of old age (understanding of nature). Lullus ‘ars magna.’ | ||
| III. | The Time of Transition | January 06, 1924 |
| The transition from clear spiritual knowledge to an instinctive feeling in the 15th–18th century. Revelations in Symbol — The Founding of Rosicrucianism, the brotherhood of 7 — The Sacrifice of the Star-Knowledge and the Impulse to Freedom. | ||
| IV. | The Relationship of Earthly Man to the Sun | January 11, 1924 |
| Heart-Knowledge and the Attitude of the Rosicrucian Schools — Intelligence and the Earth-Demon — Lost Manhood — The Dawn of the Michael Age. | ||
| V. | Occult Schools in the 18th and First Half of the 19th Century | January 12, 1924 |
| Rosicrucian Figures and Symbols — Inner Experience of the Bones and of the Marrow in the Bones — The Relationship of the Spinal Marrow to the Moon — Substance and Form. | ||
| VI. | The Tasks of the Michael Age | January 13, 1924 |
| Writings in the Astral Light and Evolution-Memory — The Principle of the Rosicrucian Initiation — The Secret of Modern Initiation — The Principle of Initiation as a Principle of Civilisation. | ||