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Rudolf Steiner e.Lib
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Occult Science - An Outline
Rudolf Steiner e.Lib Document
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Occult Science - An Outline
Knowledge of the Higher Worlds
The end in view for which the pupil engages in meditation upon
symbolic thought-pictures or upon certain feelings, is neither more
nor less than the development, within the astral body, of higher
organs of perception. These organs are created out of the substance of
the astral body itself; they bring the pupil into contact with a new
world, and in this new world he learns to know himself as a new
I or Ego. They differ from the organs with which we observe the
world of the physical senses in that they are active. Eye and ear
remain passive, allowing light and sound to act upon them; of the
organs of perception that belong to the soul and spirit it can truly
be said that while they are perceiving they are in continual activity,
and furthermore that they comprehend, quite consciously, the
objects and facts that they perceive. This gives us the feeling that
when we know with our soul and spirit, the very knowing is
at the same time a blending with the facts we come to know; we feel we
are living within them.
The several organs of soul and spirit that develop in this manner may
be called, by way of comparison, lotus-flowers; the name accords with
the form in which supersensible consciousness has to picture them
picture them, that is Imaginatively. (It need hardly be said
that such a designation has no more direct relation to reality than
has the expression Flügel or wing in
the word Lungenflügel meaning Lobe of the
lung.) Specific kinds of meditation work upon the astral body in
such a way as to lead to the development of one or other of these
lotus flowers. After all that has been given in this book,
it should be quite unnecessary to stress the fact that we have not to
think of these organs of perception as though the symbolic picture of
them which the name suggests were a direct imprint of their real
nature. They are supersensible and consist in a definite activity of
the soul; indeed they only exist in so far and for so long s the
activity continues. We could as little speak, in connection with them,
of anything observable by the senses, as we could of seeing a mist or
cloud around a man when he is thinking! Those who insist on picturing
the supersensible in sensual terms will inevitably be involved in
misunderstandings. Superfluous as this remark should be, I let it
stand, since one is constantly meeting with people who believe in the
supersensible and yet want to picture it in far too sensual a way;
also there are opponents of supersensible knowledge who imagine that
when the scientist of the Spirit speaks of lotus flowers
he thinks of them as tangible objects howsoever refined objects
perceptible to the outer senses.
Every meditation undertaken for the attainment of Imaginative
cognition has its influence, if rightly carried out, upon one or other
of these organs. (In my book Knowledge of the Higher Words and its
Attainment meditations and exercises are given that take effect on
this or that particular organ.) A proper spiritual training will
arrange the several exercises in such order as to enable these organs
of the soul to develop singly, together, or in due succession, as the
case may be. This development asks for great patience and perseverance
on the part of the pupil. The degree of patience a man gains in the
ordinary course of life will not suffice. For it will be a long time
in many instances a very long time indeed before the
organs are so far developed that the pupil can make use of them for
perceiving in the higher world. The moment he does become able to do
this, he enters upon the stage of Enlightenment, so-called in
contradistinction to the stage of Preparation, Probation or
Purification, where the pupil is engaged upon the exercises
that are given for the development of the organs. (The word
Purification is used, because by means of the exercises he
undergoes, the pupil cleanses a certain region of his
inner life, casting out from it everything that has its source in the
external world of the senses.) It may well happen that even before he
reaches the stage of Enlightenment, a man will frequently experience
sudden flashes that come from a higher world. These he should receive
with thankfulness. The fact that he has them enables him already to
bear witness to the spiritual world. He must however not weaken in his
resolve if no such moments come during the time of Preparation
which may perhaps seem to him to be lasting all too long. Anyone who
allows himself to grow impatient because he can still see
nothing has not yet succeeded in finding his right relation to a
higher world. He alone has done so who can look upon the exercises he
undertakes in his training as an end in themselves. With these he is
in very truth doing work upon something in him that is of the nature
of soul and spirit, namely, upon his astral body. And even when as yet
he sees nothing, he can feel: I am really working
and functioning in soul and spirit. If however he has made up his mind
beforehand as to what he is going to see, he will not have
this feeling. He will in that case be disregarding what is in truth of
incalculable significance. He should on the contrary be paying careful
attention to all that he experiences while doing the exercises. For
this is radically different from anything he meets with in the world
of sense. Already at this stage he will remark that in working upon
his astral body he is not working into some indifferent substance, but
that in his astral body lives a world of quite another kind a
world of which his life amid the outer senses tells him nothing. Even
as the external world of the senses works upon the physical body, so
are the higher Beings working upon the astral body. The pupil will
impinge upon the higher life in his own astral body,
provided he himself does not stand in the way. If he is continually
saying to himself: I can perceive nothing at all, it will
generally mean that he has formed his own idea of what the spiritual
percept has to look like, and since he does not see it in the form he
has imagined, he says: I see nothing at all.
The pupil who has the right attitude to his exercises will find
increasingly that the very doing of them is something he can love for
its own sake. He knows moreover that the doing of them places him
already in a world of soul and spirit, and he waits with patience and
above all with devotion for what is to come. This mood in the pupil
can be best lifted into consciousness in the following words: I
am resolved to carry out whatever exercises are right for me, and I
know that I shall meantime be receiving as much as is important for me
to receive. I do not demand it, I am not impatient; I simply hold
myself ready all the time to receive it. It is quite wrong to
contend: So then the pupil is to grope his way on in the dark,
perhaps for an incredibly long time, with no means of knowing that he
is on the right path until success prove it to him! For it is
simply not true that the pupil has to wait for the exercises to
achieve their end before he can be assured of their validity. If he
undertakes them in the right spirit he need not wait for their
eventual outcome; the satisfaction that he has in doing them will of
itself make it clear to him that he is on the true path. Proper
practice of exercises belonging to a path of spiritual training brings
with it a sense of satisfaction that is no mere satisfaction but
certain knowledge. The pupil knows: I am engaging in an activity which
I can see is taking me forward in the right direction. Every pupil of
the Spirit can have this certainty at every moment, if only he
observes his experiences with sensitive discernment. If he is crudely
inattentive, he is letting them go past him like a person out walking
who is so deeply absorbed in his own reflections that he does not see
the trees on either side of his path although he could quite
well be seeing them if he would only turn his eyes in their direction.
It is indeed undesirable that any other result than this one, which
always attends the doing of the exercises, should be induced before
the time is due. For it may well be that a seemingly successful result
is no more than the smallest fraction of what should ensue in right
and proper course. In spiritual development a partial success will
often lead to a prolonged postponement of complete success. Moving
familiarly among such forms of spiritual life as disclose themselves
at an imperfect stage renders one insusceptible to influences that
lead to higher levels of development. The seeming boon namely
the fact that one has after all had sight of the spiritual world
is not really a boon at all; this kind of beholding
cannot impart objective truth but only delusive pictures.
Last Modified: 02-Nov-2024
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