The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Let's make it clear to ourselves what's really brought about by meditation. Streams of spiritual life are always flowing through the world. These streams can't flow into us when we're thinking about everyday things. But our meditation words are like portals that are to lead us into the spiritual world. They have the strength to open up our soul so that the thoughts of our great leaders, the masters of wisdom and of the harmony of feelings can stream into us. For this to happen the deepest quiet must reign in us. We must realize that meditation is a very intimate soul activity. So we should let the meditation words given to us by our teacher live in our soul right after we wake up and before other thoughts have gone through our soul. But we shouldn't look upon them as stuff to speculate on and philosophize about; we should think as little as possible about their meaning and significance. We have enough time for reflection the rest of the day. We should hold that off completely while meditating. We shouldn't repeat the words meaninglessly but should be clear that the words open our soul to the instreaming of divine beings, just as a flower opens and lets in sunlight. High spiritual beings whom we call masters stream down to us. We should realize that it's mainly they who guide us and are near to us in meditation. We should also know that they walk on earth incarnated in a physical body. Thus we should let the meditation words live in our soul without pondering about them; rather we should try to grasp the words' spiritual content with our feelings and to permeate ourselves completely with it. The power of these words doesn't just lie in the thoughts, but also in their rhythm and sound. We should listen to this, and if we shut out all sensorial things we can say that we should revel in the sound of the words. Then the spiritual world sounds into us. Since so much depends on the sound of the words one can't translate a meditation formula into a foreign language without further ado. The mediation formulas we received in the German language were brought down from the spiritual world directly for us. Every formula has the greatest effect in the original language. When an East Indian wants to give the highest expression to his reverence for the Godhead who reveals himself in three Logoi, he summarizes his feeling in three times three words that describe the activity of the three Logoi:

But the whole wealth of spiritual strength is only reproduced if the words are said in Sanskrit, the original language. Then one hears how even the air resonates:

The same applies to the Lord's Prayer. Spoken in German, practically the only thing that's effective is the underlying thought. The Latin Pater noster has a better effect, but the whole power and fullness only come to expression in the original Aramaic.

So we should hear our way entirely into the sound of the words. With the word schoepfen (create, also means to scoop, drink) we should have an idea that's as graphic as possible, as if one were dipping out of one vessel into another. All of our thoughts should be as pictorial and as full of content as possible. While meditating the meditation words should receive inner life, but we should exclude all spatial ideas and cling entirely to our senses. For there's spatial perception on the physical plane but not in the astral world. But the color, light, sound, aroma and so on that are connected with the senses are also present in the astral world. That's why in meditation we should try to awaken a sensory idea that's as clear and full of content as possible. Spiritual beings express their nature in colors, sounds, aromas and everything that the senses perceive, and they flow into us when we connect ourselves with sensations. The first Logos streams on as a directly perceptible aroma. A being of a higher or lower nature lives in every odor. Very high, god beings live in incense; they draw us up directly to God. The lowest kind of beings are incarnated in musk scent. People who know about such things use musk for sensual attraction. Spiritual beings also live in sounds and colors, “In pure rays of light ...” One should get a bright, luminous mental image, one should see and feel how luminous streams flow down to one. Every meditation formula is equipped with strength to awaken slumbering forces. But if one always longs for new exercises one destroys the exercise's force and doesn't get its fruit.

In some elementary esoteric schools a pupil is told to think nothing but glass, glass, glass for 15 minutes every day, for instance. If he succeeds in really keeping all other thoughts out of his soul during this time, then his soul becomes quite empty and pure, and the forces slumbering in it awaken, if other influences aren't too strong. But our meditation formulas contain great spiritual forces; they are portals to the spiritual world. The exercises get ever simpler the more a pupil progresses.

We should never let a feeling of regret arise when we let the pictures of the day pass by us in reverse order. We shouldn't wish that we had been better, we should want to get better. We should think: I couldn't do otherwise back then, but now I can do it better and I will do it better in future. With every experience we should ask: Did I do it right; couldn't I have done it better? We should look at ourselves as a stranger, as if we looked at and criticized ourselves from outside. It's very important to be able to remember little details in our daily life. A general who won a big battle has a picture of it before his eyes that evening. But he forgot how he put his boots on and took them off again. If we see ourselves walking down a street we should try to remember how the rows of house ran, which store windows we passed, the people we met, how they and we looked. Then we see ourself going into a store and we recall which sales lady came towards us, what she had on, how she spoke, moved, etc. We must make a big effort to recall such details, and this strengthens the soul's forces.

With practice one can get to the point where the whole day's life runs through the soul, clear as wall paintings with all details in five minutes. This exercise is useless for someone who runs through the day superficially and just registers the events colorlessly. If a man walks a stretch and wants to bring this back he can stand still and try to remember what's behind him. Or he can turn around and look at where he's gone. If a period of time has passed we can initially only recall this with our memory and can't look back at the period of time that has elapsed. But this looking back that we only know in connection with space is also possible in time, and we learn to do it by trying to let the last day pass before us as clearly as possible in perceptible pictures. No event of the past is entirely gone, they're all there in the Akashic record. This is the only way one learns to read it. Initially one only sees things that concern oneself from this, and gradually also other things. That's why the evening retrospect is such an important, indispensable exercise.

An esoteric will gradually notice that his memory is worsening, until it disappears, but it will be replaced by the ability to see the past directly.

The subsidiary exercises strengthen the pupil's soul character, bring it into the right form, and make the results of meditation good. If one chooses a match for the first exercise one has to make a real effort to think about this at least five times every day. It's this effort that awakens the soul's forces. What does a match look like? What kinds of matches exist? How are they made? For what are they used? Where are they stored? What harm can they do? etc. After awhile one will get a feeling of inner certainty and firmness after the exercise. One should pour this into one's head and spinal cord, as if it were water.

Initiative in actions is the second exercise. One chooses actions that one wouldn't have done otherwise and one does them every day at a particular time. Simple exercises that one has to force oneself to do are the most effective to start with. Here again one soon notices a feeling of firmness and the urge to be active. One should pour this feeling like water down from the head to the heart to incorporate it completely.

In the third period one begins to put an end to all fluctuations in one's soul life. All rejoicing up to heaven—saddened to death must disappear. No pain should depress one, no joy should bring one outside of oneself. Fear, excitement and lack of composure must disappear. Thereby a feeling of quiet equanimity becomes noticeable like an inner warmth. One concentrates this feeling in the heart and lets it radiate from there into hands and feet, and then towards the head. After the third period one develops what one calls positivity in one's soul. One also tries to see the good and beautiful in the worst, ugliest and most terrible things, as the Persian legend about Christ tells us. One day one will have a feeling of inner bliss. One concentrates this in the heart, lets it radiate to the head and then out through the eyes.

In the fifth period one practices never letting one's future be determined by the past. One must become entirely unbiased, take in everything, open one's soul. If someone says to one: The church steeple turned last night, one shouldn't laugh at him but should think: Maybe there's a law of nature that I don't know yet. Then one will soon get the feeling that something is streaming into one from the space outside. One sucks this in through eyes, ears and the whole skin, as it were. Then in the sixth period all five exercises should be done at once, to give a harmonious blend. One should also try not to take too much time in doing the morning meditation and the evening review.

One who wants to become a real esoteric should realize that he attains something now that all men will attain later. And he must be clearly aware that great tasks will be given him someday, that he'll be used for the further development of mankind in the future. This thought, this goal must live in him entirely, otherwise he's not an esoteric in the true sense. And if he develops himself into the future like this his eyes will also be opened about the past, and then the present becomes understandable out of the future and past. Thereby past, present and future become harmoniously united. The great masters put this into the sacred syllable AUM. That's one of many interpretations that can be given to this syllable. When we speak this syllable the great masters are here with us and the air resounds with the spiritual power of these sounds: AUM

From notes B: Mercury staff/snake of evil and of good that guides man in the overcoming of evil through his own power through knowledge (Mercury).

Asuras are spirits of the very greatest egoism who remained behind during Saturn evolution. They want to condense matter and compress it ever more so that it can't be spiritualized and brought back to its original condition. They're the dregs of the planetary evolution that goes form Saturn to Vulcan. The asuras inhabit the moon and from there they work on the men whom they want to drag down into the eighth sphere and thereby tear away from progressive evolution and its goal—the Christ. All those who strive towards the eighth sphere will eventually live on a moon.

AUM. One wards off bad influences when one says it in the right way; it connects man with the creating Godhead, the three Logoi. The evil beings who want to tear men away from the Godhead can't stand it. AUM must be spoken with the awareness:

A is atma, U is buddhi, M is the wisdom that directs the higher self to AUM.

Most people don't know much more about the word Logos than that it consists of five letters. What they say about these high beings, the three Logoi is often just dilettantish talk. A comprehensive, preparatory understanding is necessary to look into the world of the three Logoi. But men often think that they can understand the very highest things right away. “In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was a God. Everything was made by the same, and without it nothing that was made came into being.” If we let this opening of John's Gospel reverberate in our soul, we get an inkling that something very high is being referred to.

How is the present sun related to the Sun condition that preceded the Moon condition? An advancement has taken place. The present fixed-star sun was previously the planet Sun. The best forces and beings separated from the planet sun, and those that were less highly developed went on with the Moon and then with our earth. Every planet eventually becomes a fixed star.

Our earth is an ensouled being with lower and higher beings on it. When a planet develops into a fixed star the beings who are embodied on it also go higher. The best forces and beings of old Sun became the fixed-star sun. When our earth has gone through the Jupiter condition, and as Venus is almost a sun, the human being will be similar to the sublime beings who now live on the sun. And then what does a sun become? When a sun has attained maturity a zodiac forms. Zodiacs also arise and perish. Even more mighty and sublime beings work down from a zodiac than from a sun. The sun that shines down on us now will someday shine down as the stars of a new zodiac. The spirit beings of this new zodiac will be creative souls, creative beings at the highest stage of development. If we look at human development we also see organs that are standing at the end of their development and are withering, and others like the heart will be a voluntary muscle in future, and the larynx will creatively speak out human descendents with the word. This will begin when the earth planet becomes a fixed star and then a zodiac. Beings who went through worlds before the earth was Saturn sounded down the creative word when the earth was at the beginning of its evolution. “In the beginning was the word” should be taken quite literally. At the end of evolution man will be a being who creates through the word. He arose from a creative Logos and he'll later be a creative logos himself.

The creative word is the third Logos of the Trinity. He's the world sound that resounds through the world. A higher, more sublime power is the creative light. Man will also be a shining light later. Warmth that's raised to a higher level becomes light. In the future man won't just be sound—he'll become a radiant, shining being that is light. The creative light is creative for our world as the second Logos. The world aroma goes through the cosmos as the highest revelation; it's a higher principle of creation than world sound and world light. World sound is the third Logos, world light is the second Logos and the universe's aroma is the first, most creative and highest Logos. In folk sagas we have the opposite, bad aroma of the devil, that indicates that he's the destructive being of the world. In occultism one calls the eternal part of man that goes through all evolutions his personal, spirit aroma.

It's very important for moderns to get a strong dose of esoteric life. Plagues, epidemics and wars would rage among men in a terrible way if the wise masters hadn't decided to give mankind a deepening in the spiritual realm.

There have always been three kinds of esoterics who were developed in initiation schools: initiates, clairvoyants and adepts. In ancient times it often happened that initiates had a full understanding of spiritual truths and laws, although they weren't clairvoyant. Others in the same brotherhood were clairvoyant but couldn't understand what they saw, so the initiates explained it to them. Today there's less of a separation between clairvoyance and initiation. Whereas adepts were able to put what the clairvoyant saw and initiates explained to practical use. Adeptship must retreat almost entirely today. Our egotistical age can't make proper use of such high capacities. The highest adepts often only work into peoples' fates twice in two hundred years. Their strength is saved for special occasions. For men aren't yet mature enough for certain things. It would only have a harmful effect if one wanted to give them out. Even you, my brothers and sisters, couldn't receive some of the highest truths. If I would tell you such a truth this room would be empty in a few minutes. Even people who have reached a certain stage in esoteric training can't stand certain truths. And yet these are the very highest truths, and your training will eventually enable to you to receive them. But one who receives them too soon loses all support in life. Imagine that a narrow plank is laid over a deep abyss. How many of you would be able to walk over it without getting dizzy? Certainly not all. But if someone painted a path as wide as this plank on the floor of a room it would be easy to walk along the strip without going off to the left or right. And yet he's doing the same thing he'd have to do to walk the plank or strip on the ground. The strip's continuation is the physical world, the world of the senses. It gives men certainty, since it continually corrects wrong thoughts, feelings, etc. Now imagine that the physical world's barriers had fallen so that a man really floats in air without outer support. This is an experience that everyone must go through at some point.

You all know that the heart is just at the beginning of its development and that it will later be a very important organ One doesn't have to accept this on faith for simple observation and reflection lets one see this. It's the greatest riddle for modern scientists that the involuntary heart muscle is transversely striped just like the voluntary muscles this tells us that the heart will be a voluntary muscle in the future.

We speak of reincarnation and the law of karma. One can tell oneself: I don't believe in reincarnation, but I can assume that it exists. I'll act as if my assumption is true and wait to see what comes of it. A man who thinks and acts like this will make amazing discoveries. In everything that happens to him he'll think: I caused this in a past life and now bear the consequences of my own deeds. If such a man unconsciously did something foolish and he's punished for it, he'll think: I'll make myself aware of this foolishness, so that I can see that I was the one who brought on these ugly consequences. This is the real meaning of: Whoever hits you on the right cheek, turn the other one to him also.

Anyone who succeeds in looking for the cause of everything that hits him in himself has accomplished a great deal. One who does this will soon notice that it brings him forward, that he begins to loosen karmic chains and increasingly gets control of his life. Such a man treads his life's path freely and surely. One can verify all theosophical teachings in the same way. So let's all try to bring ever more spirituality into life and make the light and life that the great masters stream into us alive. You should all realize that the battles theosophy and especially esotericism will have to fight with the outer world will get ever bigger. There it's a matter of standing fast and being silent, my sisters and brothers, and stand fast, as you look at your goal and at the great masters who stand by us.

The rejection of spiritual wisdom is a sin against the Holy Spirit.

Gabriel transformed men's brains and an organ developed in the forehead that should be used. If no spiritual content flowed into it this part of the brain would wither, giving rise to infectious diseases and pestilence. Spiritual science was kept secret under Gabriel. This science is suppose to stream out into the open under Michael. Brains are already worked on in the mother's body. When we look at an outside object it sends light (through Michael) into our eyes, and this creates a mirror image in the brain. The resulting mental image enables us to perceive the object consciously. In meditation we have to create the mental image without an outer object. Through the pictures that we create for ourselves the force of what we've made a picture of can stream into us. We can create such imaginations more easily through the forces that we take into us in esoteric classes. We should take in such teachings with hearty feelings.

Saturn forces work on the sense organs. The terrible degenerations that we see in sexual things will get much worse when Saturn rules the earth 400 years from now. It's a matter of training warriors to combat sensual things. We're called upon to train ourselves so that we can fight this battle. Michael needs hosts of helpers to fight out on the physical plane what he's already overcome on the astral plane. That's the great task that we have to fulfill.

The mood of one's soul before and after an esoteric class must be quite different. It's not at all important whether a soul always remembers what it experienced in an esoteric class, but it must have the feeling that it took something with it. Just as one knows one's name, so one must bear what one received in an esoteric class in one's soul. One knows one's name when one is asked for it, even if one doesn't always repeat it to oneself. Likewise the stream of esoteric life must always rest in one's soul. Then esoteric life will deepen our soul ever more, and that's necessary for the coming time.

Our whole civilization has its origin in the spiritual world. That's where plans are made that govern our life on the physical plane. Down here we only see how one event after another takes place according to physical laws, but the great spiritual causes are hidden from us. It's events on higher planes of our existence that bring about physical events. Let's make this quite clear through an example.

An especially important event took place on the astral plane in November 1879. Since then esoteric life has taken on a quite different direction. The esoteric stream that lived in mankind since the 14^th century was replaced by a new one. Previously all occult life took place very quietly and hidden from the outer world under the direction of the archangel Gabriel (“annunciation”).

Something quite similar to a birth took place on the astral plane in 1879. What had slowly ripened since the 14^th century could now be carried into the world in a freer way, even though only for a few people. For Gabriel's rule was followed by that of the archangel Michael. He's the radiant sun that lets esoteric wisdom shine out into a small host of people. Materialism is included in the divine plan of creation and it has a purpose in the whole world. But the time has now come for the esoteric sun to shine brightly under Michael's radiant direction. For materialism's dark forces are increasing.

Michael's radiant rule will be followed by a dark, terrible age that starts about 2300. Together with Michael, a dark God has begun his rule—the God Mammon. For occultism Mammon isn't just the God of money. He's the leader of all base, black forces. And his hosts attack men's bodies and souls to corrode and ruin them. There's a lot of talk about bacteria today, and they influence a lot of things. In future they'll increase in a terrifying way, and many human bodies will waste away from terrible diseases and plagues. The brand of sin will be stamped on men's bodies for all to see. Another archangel—Oriphiel—will rule then. He must come to shake men up to their true vocation through terrible tortures. So that this can happen in the right way a small group of people must be prepared today to spread esoteric life in the black age 400–600 years from now.

One under Michael's rule who feels the urge to participate in spiritual life is called upon to serve archangel Michael and to learn under him so that someday he'll be mature enough to also serve the terrible Oriphiel in the right way. A sacrifice is demanded from those who want to dedicate themselves to a higher life. One should only want to receive spiritual life and experience an awakening if one later wants to use this to put oneself, one's will and everything one has in the service of mankind only.

In four to six centuries the small group of men who are being prepared today will serve the God Oriphiel so that mankind can be saved. If in that age men wanted to be spiritual leaders who hadn't been prepared to stand fast in all storms and to resist Mammon's hosts, they wouldn't be able to serve the God Oriphiel in the right way, and mankind would not be lifted out of their misery. So in order to do it we must work very earnestly now to fulfill our tasks then.

But when dark powers rage most terribly, the brightest light also shines. Oriphiel has ruled before. That was the time when Christ appeared on earth. Bad powers of degeneration and decadence were ruling everywhere on earth then. And the human race could only be shaken higher by terrible means. Oriphiel is called the archangel of wrath, who purifies mankind with a strong hand.

The story in the Bible where Christ swings a scourge to chase the money changers out of the temple has a deep meaning. Back when things were darkest on earth, Christ appeared as the savior of mankind. Oriphiel's reign ended 109 years after Christ's appearance, and he was replaced by Anael. Then came Zachariel, then Raphael; Samael ruled during the Renaissance and Gabriel from the 16^th century until 1879. Then Michael began to rule, and circa 2300 Oriphiel, the terrible archangel of wrath, will be ruling things. And as once before, spiritual light will shine into darkness brightly and radiantly. Christ will appear again on earth, although in a different form than before. We're called upon to receive him and to serve him.

When you, my sisters and brothers, let the spiritual life that streams into your soul live in you so that it reverberates in your meditations, you then have the right fruit. You should let what's received echo in your meditations. While you do that the spiritual powers of the world stream into you. The world is always flowed through by spiritual streams that proceed from the great masters of wisdom and of the harmony of feelings. The masters continuously pour streams of love and wisdom over humanity, but men's souls aren't always ready and open to receive them. But meditation words are magic words that open soul portals so that divine life can move in. That's why one shouldn't speculate with one's intellect about meditation words, but should open the soul for forces that are higher than merely intellectual ones. If one speculates about them with one's intellect then only forces that are already in one become active. But higher forces are supposed to awaken. One shouldn't want to solve riddles in one's meditation words, one should let them solve riddles, for they're much wiser than the intellect can ever be. That's why one should let them work on one and take in what they permit to flow into one's soul, let them live completely in one's soul.

Meditation words were born from the laws of the spiritual world and didn't arise through speculation. Something special lives in every vowel. Each of the vowels has a different sound value. And just as the soul feels the effect of sounds, so it should devote itself to the pictures that the words mediate to it. In meditation one should try to think as concretely as possible, and to be as far away as possible from abstract ideation.

Let's take a meditation formula that most of you know. In the first line:

Now one tries to permeate soft moonlight completely with one's love, to pour it into oneself, so that the mild light begins to radiate through the warmth of one's love, and in the flood of rays one feels the Godhead glowing in one's soul. In the following words:

But it's not only the pictures that live in the soul during meditation that draw us towards the divine and open the soul's portals. A deep wisdom and a high divine life has also been placed into the vowels. It makes a difference whether this or that vowel resounds in the soul. Let's take the vowel i. This always expresses a centralizing, a striving toward the center. The a means something quite different. It's an expression of an inner worship of the divine. The i strives towards the center of the universe, whereas the a(h) remains distant and bows before the Holiest in devotion. So if we look at our formula:

This is just one way of understanding the formula, and one small part of the deep wisdom that rests in it. It would be confusing if I wanted to tell you all the deep secrets that are hidden in it. There's no letter and no sign in it that doesn't have a deep, deep meaning. That's the way the divine word of creation resounded when it once let the universe arise. You once heard it sounding, but your souls weren't aware of it yet. At that time you descended from the spirit, and you'll go back there in full consciousness. Born out of the spirit, living in an earthly body, you'll return to the divine spirit of the world through the power of the spirit.

If it was our last esoteric lesson * the great laws of spiritual life revealed in the course of human development, they were the great spiritual powers that guide everything that happens on the physical plan. And which replace each other in their effectiveness, today we want to speak in a somewhat more intimate way of the laws of spiritual life, as it takes place within man himself.

The one in an occult training course is, in a sense, a waiter, a seeker. He is waiting for a new world to uncover him one day except for the one he has otherwise perceived. He is waiting for one day to say to himself, "I see a new world;" I will be able to say to himself; "I will be able to do so." Between all the things I have been able to perceive in the room so far, I see a fullness of spiritual beings that were previously hidden from me. -To make this quite clear to you, you must call the seven states of consciousness that man goes through in the course of his development before the soul. The first state of consciousness that man underwent was a dull, dawny degree of consciousness in which man felt one with the cosmos; We call Saturndasein this state. In the soldon, the level of consciousness decreased, but it became all the brighter for it. When man lived through the man's being, his consciousness was similar to what we experience as the last remnant in our dreams, it was a dull image consciousness. Here on earth we have the bright awareness of the day, which will remain when man rises again to the consciousness of images on Jupiter, so that we then have a bright consciousness of images there. Be. Even two higher states, the inspired and intuitive state of consciousness, will continue to rise to two higher states, the person. So our bright awareness of the day stands in the middle of the dull image consciousness of the moon and the bright image consciousness of Jupiter. And what the esoteric is waiting for to reveal itself to him one day is Jupiter consciousness. It will reach each of you once, at one earlier, at the other later, that depends on your abilities, on the degree of inner maturity.

Now, however, the consciousness of Jupiter in its first germs is already present in every human being. In a very delicate way, the future consciousness is already indicated, man is only unable to interpret it. This is precisely the esoteric life to a large extent that the disciple learns the subtle processes in himself and in his surroundings.

One still the old moon consciousness, in the other the new consciousness of Jupiter is already there, are the feeling of shame and the feeling of fear. In the feeling of shame, where the blood is pushed towards the periphery of the body, there is still one last remnant of the moon consciousness, and in the Feeling of fear, where the blood flows after the heart to find a fixed center, is annoedly announced by Jupiter consciousness. So normal daytime consciousness strikes out after two sides.

Shame---------Standard----------Feeling of anxiety

When we talk about Anything Feeling shame and the pubic blush rising in our faces, we experience something reminiscent of being a moon. Imagine a Modem Man. He could not yet «I» to say to himself, but lived in a dull, dawning image consciousness, embedded in astric forces and Beings with which he felt one and in harmony. Think of it, my sisters and brothers, one day with such a Modem Man the feeling suddenly dawns: I am a «I». I am different from the others, I am an independent being, and all the other beings in my environment look at me. -The whole lunar man would have glowed through from top to bottom a very enormous feeling of shame, he would have disappeared, trying to go down with shame, when he could have felt such a premature feeling of self. So we, my sisters and brothers, too, when a sense of shame arrives, would like to disappear, sink under the ground, dissolve our self-iness, as it were. Imagine how the ancient Modem man was embedded in harmony with the forces and Beings of his surroundings. When an enemy being approached him, he did not think, but he knew instinctively how to avoid it. He acted in a feeling that, if he had been conscious, he could have expressed as follows: I know that the legality of the world is not set up in such a way that this wild beast will now tear me apart, but the harmony of the world is such that it means it. Who must protect me from my enemy.

So directly in harmony with the forces of space felt the old moonman. And if a feeling of self had awakened in him, it would have immediately disturbed this harmony. And the feeling of me actually, as it began to penetrate man on earth, has brought him more and more into disharmony with his surroundings. The Helllistener hears the universe ring out in a mighty harmony, and when he compares the sounds that penetrate from the individual people to him, so Today this gives a discord to all people, more to one, to the other, less so, but it is a discord. And your task is to resolve this discord more and more in harmony in the course of your development. Through the insoence this discord has arisen, but wisely it was set up by the spiritual powers that dominate and guide space. If people had always remained in harmony, they would never have come to self-employment. The discord was used so that man could achieve harmony freely, on his own strength. The self-confident feeling of self had to develop first at the expense of inner harmony. When the time comes when the consciousness of Jupiter lights up, and man again comes back in harmony connection with the forces of the cosmos, then he will save his self-conscious feeling with his self-confidence into the new state of consciousness, so that man then Independent self and yet will be in harmony with space.

We have now seen that the new consciousness of Jupiter is already being announced in the feeling of fear. But whenever a future state begins to occur before time, it is premature and not quite in place. This will be clear to you by an example. If a flower, which by its very nature should bloom in August, is brought to heap in a greenhouse as early as May, it will no longer be able to unfold in August, when its actual flowering period has come; Her powers will be exhausted and she will no longer fit into the conditions she should then get into. And in May, too, as soon as you remove it from the greenhouse, it will have to go to the bottom, because it does not fit into the natural conditions of this time of year. Straadeso it is with the sense of anxiety. It is still out of place today and much less so in the future. What happens when you feel an anxiety? The blood is pressed into the center of man, into the heart, in order to form a fixed center, in order to make man strong against the outside world. It is the innermost power of the I that causes this. This power of the I, which acts on the blood, which must become more and more conscious and on Jupiter, man will then be able to consciously direct his blood after the center and become strong. The unnatural and harmful thing about it, however, today is the feeling of fear associated with this blood flow. This must not be allowed to happen in the future, only the forces of the I, without fear, must work there.

In the course of human development, the outside world around us is becoming more and more hostile. More and more you must learn to confront your inner power with the encroaching outside world. But fear must disappear. And especially for those who undergo esoteric training, it is necessary, unavoidably, to free himself from all feelings of fear and fear. Only here does fear have a certain justification, where it alerts us to stand strong, but all the unnatural feelings of fear that torment people must disappear altogether. What should happen if man still has feelings of fear and fear, and Jupiter consciousness comes to an end? There, the outside world will face man much, much more hostile and terrible than it is today. A person who does not get used to fear here will fall there from a terrible horror to the other.

In order for man to fully grow up in the face of the evil forces of the future, he must have the innermost power of his self in his hands, he must be able to regulate the blood consciously in such a way. That it makes him strong against evil, but without fear of any kind. He must then have the power that drives the blood inward in his power. But even that other ability to pour the blood from the heart to the periphery must not be lost on it. Because the state of Jupiter will in some way also mean a return to the old moon consciousness. Man will come back into harmony with the great world laws and feel at one with them. He will regain the ability to flow together with the spiritual world powers, but not unconsciously and dawnfully as on the moon, but on Jupiter he will always maintain his bright awareness of the day and self-confident I-feeling and yet live in harmony. With the forces and laws of the world. The discord will then dissolve in harmony. And in order to be able to let oneness flow into the harmony of space, he must consciously learn to let the innermost power of his self radiate from the heart. He must therefore be able to consciously centralize the inner forces of his blood when an enemy confronts him, and he must also be able to radiate them consciously. Then only he will be up to future circumstances.

The one who is striving for an inner development must begin today to gradually get these forces more and more into his power. He does it by consciously learning his breath and moving in. When man draws his breath, the forces of the I enter into activity, which bring him into connection with the forces of the cosmos, those forces that radiate from the heart to the outside. And when man spends his breath and when he abstains from the breath, those forces of the I enter into activity, which push for the center points, after the heart, and there create a fixed center there. Thus, even today, when the disciple consciously does his breathing exercises in this sense, he learns to gradually master the powers of his self. No one can believe, however, that they independently carry out such exercises if they have not yet received instructions on them. Everyone will get them at right time. But even for those who do no such exercises, it is never too early to familidate themselves with the meaning of these exercises and to gain understanding of them. They will then become all the more fruitful for him later. So you, my sisters and brothers, are also to gain more and more understanding for the subtle processes within you and in the world as a whole and gradually grow into the future periods of human development.

* See therefore december 5 1907

What we aspire to in esoteric life is the attainment of a different, higher state of consciousness than is the one we are in now. We are looking to reach a state that would only occur—with the ordinary course of things—on Jupiter. In a different way, of course, this condition occurs in the occult pupil, who undergoes the development in advance, than in the Jupiter man. Jupiter man will have a very different physical body than we possess today.

There are states in everyday consciousness in all people reminiscent of the moon's state and others in which the state of Jupiter protrudes. When the pubic blush kicks us in the face, we repeat a piece of lunar condition. Why this? On the moon, we didn't have blood yet. But we know that blood is the expression of our self. On the old moon, all the forces that work in our blood today were outside ours. There was not yet a feeling of me in us. If we blush out of shame, we would like to say: Oh I wouldn't be, I soak into the earth.—In doing so, we are pushing the blood outwards, as it were, passing our self off.

Another condition that points to Jupiter is the one that occurs when we feel fright, fear by fading. What is happening? We push our blood for the heart to strengthen our self. We do this instinctively to make ourselves strong, to avert a danger from us. On Jupiter, the heart will become an arbitrary muscle—at will we can amplify our self. For in fact, on Jupiter, events and Beings will confront us in which we have absolutely necessity to strengthen our self-consciousness. But we must seek to reach a state where we protect our self in exactly the same way as with the feeling of anxiety, without having a sense of anxiety.

If we take a deep breath and hold our breath, we recap a piece of lunar condition. If, on the other hand, we leave our breath outside, we have a piece of Jupiter's state in it. This is related to whether the secret student gets exercises in which he has to hold his breath, because in a way he has to go through the moon state, or whether he gets exercises in which he has to leave his breath outside, because he can thus reach the Jupiter state. Everyone has to be treated individually. We know that the flow of humanity is already splitting in two parts, the one that passes into the good, the moral, and the other that ends into the chilling, evil. Such conditions are already starting to take place, the germs are already present. So everything that is today in machines, instruments in the world and set in motion, on which Jupiter becomes terrible, horrifying demons. Anything that serves only the principle of usefulness will once become such terrible powers. Paralyzed, this can become when we transform the usefulness apparatus into those that, in addition to its usefulness, proclaim above all the beauty, the divine. It is very good that we know this. Otherwise, such powers would tear the Earth apart. We also see how enormously important it is that in the education of the child we surround the same thing with artistic impressions. Art frees up. Even the locomotive must once be converted into a machine that is beautiful.—Our feelings of fear and anxiety are food for other evil beings. We do not have to give rise to such ideas. Because on Jupiter, such demons are surrounded us in far greater numbers than they are now. But for whom there is nothing to fear in this respect, who, like a clever man, keeps his shell pure, so that no flies can accumulate around the dirt. The astral plan is actually a wisdom region; [Also the world of the physical]. It was only by having selfishness descended into them with the individual I that disorder has entered them. A certain piece now in the cosmos has descend on the physical plan at this point in time, as it were as a premature birth. These are the comets. In them we still find the laws of wisdom. Therefore, the wonderful tracks in which they measure the celestial space. And a clash with our Earth's body can therefore only be assumed by materialistic astronomy.

The secret pupil must all know these things—for without knowing he would not get any further; He will one day have to understand this.

Man receives the moon consciousness on Jupiter to Earth consciousness. He approaches spiritualization.

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One who understands the working of these numbers

When something was supposed to be given to a Rosicrucian pupil through which he could elevate himself, then the above verse and figures were placed before his soul. These figures are nothing abstract but must be permeated with one's feeling and intellect if one wants to understand them. If this happens in the right way the pupil experiences truths that are of the greatest importance for his further development. The point is the point of life from which all evolution proceeds. All life proceeds from a unity and goes over into manifoldness. Plurality springs from unity.

Everything that's around us on earth comes from man. Nature is a spread out, dismantled man. Mineral, plant and animal are found in him. All qualities that a man has are found scattered in the kingdoms of nature. Man is the crown of creation. All existing things come from man.

In the second row we see how evolution proceeds in large numbers. But plurality must bring it about that a unity arises again from it. This happened in the middle of the Atlantean race when man acquired his I. Man was still relatively simple then. Today he's already much more complicated.

In the third row we see symbols for earth, water, air and fire. The first element is contained most purely in carbon today. Man exhales carbon dioxide; this is taken in by plants and is found solidified in coal and diamonds.

The second element, water, isn't found on earth in its original condition—it's what we call oxygen. People used to drink oxygen like we drink water today. If we only had carbon and oxygen on earth we'd get old very fast. Oxygen has the ability to let everything live very rapidly and to constantly renew things.

That's why the third element, air, had to be added. It's the present nitrogen, which dampens life. Without nitrogen's influence there would be no consciousness; astrality couldn't become manifest.

The fourth element is fire. Fire plays a big role in occultism. It's the warmth element. All four elements intermingle. We maintain our own warmth with the help of fire. Self-consciousness wouldn't be possible without it. We have the physical expression of our I, blood, through it. A combustion process takes place. Thereby man has become a being with self-consciousness, as can be seen from the first symbol in the fourth row: the sulfur process. The second symbol consists of the moon, sun and the ego as an appendix. The third symbol signifies the division of the physical and etheric bodies that were originally similar; then the physical body condenses and the finer etheric body remains outside, surrounding it. This is similar to what happens when salt is dissolved: first there's a milky fluid from which salt precipitates, leaving the finer water above: the salt process. The hexagram in the fifth row represents the double nature of man that is intertwined, and the last upside down Venus is man's “I” that surpasses all other creatures.

You'll remember the esoteric saying that stood on one of our columns at the Munchen congress:

In pure thoughts you find the self
That can maintain itself.

The truth in this verse makes up a large part of esoteric life. One can divide everything that a man thinks and feels today into two areas. By far the most of what men think and feel is stimulated by outer perceptions. Thoughts and feelings are ignited by things. In principle it makes no difference whether you see a streetcar and let your thoughts be stimulated by this or if an astronomer looks through a telescope and calculates a planet's path on the basis of these observations with the help of the arc of a circle. All thoughts that are stimulated from outside hinder the astral body's development. The astral body is active all night long. All the thoughts that a man thought during the day come to it. And since these are mostly thoughts that arose through stimulation from outside, they burden it. Only the part of the astral body that preserved its harmony through the fact that it's born out of higher worlds works on the restoration of the worn out physical and etheric bodies. Only thoughts that aren't stimulated from outside work as forces in the astral body to promote and purify it.

Where do these thoughts come from? They come from divine creator beings. It's very important for an occult pupil to know about the thoughts of these spiritually creative beings. These beings had the present world in them as thoughts before they created it. The very first thing that was in them was will; the will to act was there first. This stimulated them to have feelings. And from feelings arose the thought by which they solidified and created things. Thus the world was built according to thoughts.

Today the carrying out of a human deed occurs in the reverse order. The thought is there first—stimulated by an outer object; this arouses a feeling, and only then does a man's will principle step in to bring about a deed.

All real esoteric life can only develop by taking in the thoughts of these divine creator spirits, the thoughts before the creation of things. Most people devote themselves entirely to exoteric life and try to suppress all esoteric life. Thereby they're holding up human progress. They're enemies of further development and they rigidify men. Only esoteric truths promote human evolution.

Now it's a law of occultism that every esoteric truth is used up after awhile. And mankind's leaders must see to it that a new one is proclaimed. So what do we need a new truth for, some say. They want to stop all esoteric progress. It's the task of all true occultists to see to it that thinking is kept alive and in flux. This is attained by taking in the thoughts of divine creator beings. These thoughts work at night in the astral body and work into the etheric body. And when the work of these thoughts in the astral body becomes ever stronger and more active with respect to the etheric body, then that moment approaches that must come sooner or later for every pupil where he becomes aware of spiritual worlds, where thoughts become impressed in the etheric body like a seal in wax.

One of these thoughts is in the Rosicrucian verse that we spoke of last time. Today we'll look at this verse from a somewhat different viewpoint. We know that Saturn existed first. Its matter wasn't even gaseous, it was a warmth matter. A man with present-day senses would not have seen Saturn; he would only have felt warmth if he was at the place where Saturn stood. A Saturn man consisted of warmth mater. The atmosphere of Saturn was fiery-bloody. Man didn't have any blood yet, but the first germ of his later blood lay in the atmosphere around him. Man's physical parts were only germinally present.

If one looks at how after a pralaya old Saturn changed into old Sun with the spiritual gaze that moves over the planets one notices that Saturn's warmth atmosphere condenses into air. Man gets an etheric body on the Sun. He is a shining being. Spiritual beings work through the Sun's astral atmosphere upon the etheric body, ignite it and thereby make it shine. One calls this the sulfuric process. Something quite similar arises today in thinking. When our fiery blood runs into nerve masses there's a combustion process and things light up.

When the Sun passes over to the Moon, air condenses to water. The Moon's body is a water body. We notice something very strange about this water body. Single water drops change their position in an extremely lively manner and race around with inner mobility. In some respects one can compare this property of the water drops with mercury. That's why one calls this principle that's added on the Moon the mercurial principle. The parts are put together into forms by sounds, somewhat like Chladni's sound figures. First two came together, then two pairs made four, etc., just as one still finds in new plant, animal and human forms. That's the female principle. The male principle only arose later from pure earth forces.

When the moon passed over to the earth, water condensed to earth. The precipitating salt process took place on the earth for the first time through the interaction of fire and water. Man arose from female and male and began to dissolve things again through thinking so that evolution could continue. Man received the erring I on earth.

Now if we look at this evolutionary series we see the four elements fire, air, water, earth as in the third line of the verse (2–12):

... see the three
salt, mercury and sulfur,
two arise from sun and moon (male and female)
From this grows the Son of Man
The crown of creation.

Understood like this, the Rosicrucian verse gains meaning.

Self-knowledge is the thirst and main thing in esoteric training. The teacher says: Imagine that you saw your own mirror image. You'll see a distorted image if the mirror is poor, and a correct one if it's good. If you want to see yourself the way you are, you must make the mirror nice and clear.

One who lets himself be torn back and forth by his desires and wishes, who can't make his own decisions, who follows that other people tell him, is like a boat in a sea that's being driven up and down by waves and winds. But a man who controls his wishes and desires, who doesn't let himself be influenced by other people is like a man who gets a strong and sure grip on the rudder and guides the boat to the goal through wind and weather.

People who drink alcohol have a different effect on us than men who drink milk. We're exposed to all kinds of streams that go through space. We're not free if we let these streams influence us. Let's make this clear through four people. A is one you call a sensitive man who quickly understands everything around him. But he himself is weak; nothing original comes from his soul. He's connected with B who has dispositions for a certain form of insanity, although it doesn't break out because of his robust peasant nature. C is a strong spiritual person, a genius. D is like A, sensitive and receptive. The kind of insanity that's concealed in B breaks out in the sensitive A; it's not his insanity, but B's. Sensitive D doesn't take in B's insanity, but C's geniality. D seems to be a clever, genial man, but he's just a reflection of C's cleverness; he can speak brilliantly about everything, but he can't make a single correct judgment by himself. A strong, independent personality might not seem to be very brilliant and might only make a few, hesitant judgments, but he makes them by himself, out of inner deliberation and strength. Such a man would certainly seem to be more valuable than D. An esoteric pupil should free himself from all outer influences, not by fleeing the world, but by making the true man, the spiritual or higher I, independent. We really have not just four but five members, namely, physical, etheric and astral bodies, a sheath ego and behind that the real I, the true man. We pour all influences from the outer world into this sheath ego; they tear and pull us back and forth. All influences that go from man to man in the way just indicated hit the sheath ego. We must try to strengthen the true, real I that far surpasses the other one. Then we're immune to outer influences.

How do we do that? In good Rosicrucian schools pupils were given a symbol like this. And the teacher says:

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You must do something similar when you have to make a judgment. The “right” is written on one line and “wrong” on the other. Your higher I stands at the uninscribed line. It's unmoved by the streams that go through space, whether they come from other people or other spiritual beings. This true, independent inner I, uninfluenced by the sheath's ego, then tells you the right judgment, if you listen silently and in complete inner quiet and seclusion to what it tells you.

Such forms and lines come from the spiritual realm The masters of wisdom and of the harmony of feelings gave them to us because they know that they work in the spiritual element in us. A form like this awakens the true I in a man and lifts it out of consciousness into consciousness. The Gods once created man out of forms, numbers and lines—or measure, number and weight, as one says in occultism. Numbers, lines and forms influence men. This is known by black magicians. They use them to make men dependent. They know how to use forms, numbers and lines to make men slaves of their will impulses. White magic makes a man independent. Its goal is to raise the higher man, the inner ruler, into a man's consciousness and to thereby make a man into a free, strong, independent being.