Inner Development
Berlin, 19th April 1906
Today, I would like to speak again to you about inner
development. Those who occasionally visit these talks remember
that I have already given various statements about this object.
Hence, I only touch what has already been discussed earlier and
add what exceeds this.
I
have talked repeatedly about the phenomena of the higher
worlds, and the question immediately suggests itself, how do we
come to such knowledge? — The way to this knowledge is
not so easy that it can be described in one or two hours even
in quite superficial way. Nevertheless, I have to drop a hint
now and again how one has to imagine this development. You all
know that we talk here not only about the usual physical world,
but also about the worlds of soul and spirit that we got to
know as astral world and devachan. The human being lives in
these worlds. He does not belong to one, but to three worlds.
He still belongs to much more worlds, but the knowledge of
still higher worlds exceeds the usual cognitive capacities of
the human being so much that one can talk about these worlds
only with difficulty.
The
question that we must put to ourselves is, how does the human
being penetrate up to the astral and spiritual worlds? —
These are the worlds in which he lives here, indeed, about
which he knows, however, nothing, at first, in which he lives
if he does no longer have a sensuous body. Everything that
lives as sensuous world round us can carry no weight for us.
However, then the other worlds that are attained by higher
knowledge have a higher significance to us. One often asks, to
which end does the human being need, actually, the knowledge of
other worlds than that in which he lives? If he gives his
fellow man a treat, to what end does he need to look for higher
worlds? — This is an objection that must be recognised
very soon as invalid. Those forces, facts, and beings that the
human being meets in the higher worlds are not only efficient
in these worlds but also in our physical world. For the things
are not made by themselves, they have come about by the forces
of the spiritual world. We also recognise ourselves only
cursorily if we recognise ourselves only by the senses. We
perceive with the senses only what happens between birth and
death. With the birth of the human being, a whole sum of
dispositions and abilities enter the world. Only a superficial
judgement can say that the human being should begin with his
whole world of dispositions only at the moment of birth or of
the embryonic development.
In
occultism, which deals with the worlds unknown to the senses,
one speaks of the fact that the usual human being lacks the
ability to discriminate the most significant facts. He does
not observe intensely enough how clumsily the human being
enters the world, how he learns more and more to use his only
as rudiments existing organs of the spiritual life. There we
see the one who is very little able to use the organs of his
mind, whereas the other controls not only his whole limbs in a
quite special way, but also learns to use his cerebral tools
quite specially. Just the materialistic thinker would have to
say, I believe in the significance of the human organs;
however, why do these organs answer to the feelings and
sensations of the one human being, and to the feelings and
sensations of the other one?
Everybody admits that a hammer, which the human being uses for
any reasonable performance, must have come about by a
reasonable work of thought at first. Everybody believes that
concerning the hammer. The materialistic thinker does not
believe that concerning the body, the living beings generally.
Hence, someone who studies the miraculous constructions of the
human brain or heart can never believe that all these things
could come about by chance, by any spiritless events. However,
these things present themselves with every person in another
way than it can be found with the animals. All animals are
copies of a general pattern, the particular differences come
less into consideration. The word “individuality”
makes this difference clear to us at once. Because every human
being is an individuality, he comes much more into
consideration. Every human being, every individuality prepares
his body in his way.
For
this body has to fit the special predisposition of every human
being. When he enters his existence with birth, he existed
already spiritually, and he himself has prepared the organs for
his individual use, not completely, because he is also an
animal creature, but the higher he develops, the more he also
controls the construction of his own organs. One could at most
believe that a human being — completely existing on the
lowest level — has begun at his birth, However, no
reasonable thinker can suppose that a thinking being was not
yet there before his birth. Everybody can carry out the
performances with the hammer; however, nobody is able to do the
performances of the brain of the fellow man. Hence, the human
being is not understandable without assuming that he exceeds
birth and death, but only if one recognises the forces that
have prepared the organs of the human thinking already
before.
The
rise to the astral and the spiritual worlds is connected for
the single human being with certain difficulties, with
renunciations to which he has to submit himself, and with
certain dangers. He is accustomed to the world of the senses,
but to the other worlds, he is not so accustomed. Above all, we
have to realise that the causes of many matters that remain
invisible in the world become clear to us in the higher worlds.
The human being is thereby surprised, upset. The exercises by
which he wants to advance strain him in certain ways too.
Because there are dangers, some people say that one can also
come to the highest knowledge of the divine world forces if one
knows nothing about these spiritual and astral forces concealed
behind the sensuous world. Today, one almost argues that the
human being can also rise to the divine knowledge without
passing the worlds first, which separate him from the highest
of all.
Only someone can argue in such a way who has no real idea of
the higher worlds. A kind of higher knowledge that is also
often called theosophical is nothing else than a quite usual
knowledge of the human lower self, and if he declares his lower
self as his divine ever so much, he finds nothing but his lower
self. Only outside himself, the human being finds his higher
self, because we are born out of the external world.
Some spiritual movements want to divert the human being from
the external world; one should look for the higher self only in
oneself. This point of view can never lead to a real knowledge;
it is unchristian and antichristian at the same time. Only in
the orientation to the world, which surrounds us, we find our
higher self. We must seek for the god in the invisible worlds
and in all external creatures, facts, and processes. If anybody
says to us, deny the external world, this external matter does
not exist, he denies the divine world; and there is for a big
perspective no worse knowledge than turning away from the
outside world. Just the deepening in the outside world leads to
higher knowledge. Everything physical dries out, if it is
raised a little above the earth, everything mental dries out,
if it is raised a little above the spiritual world.
The
human being has to live in the world with the attitude that he
belongs to it as the hand to the body. This attitude really
leads to higher development. Ask your own inside where the
sense of a human being is located. Just as little the human
being can turn away from the outside world, just as little the
sense of the human being is enclosed in the skin. He belongs to
the higher self of the world. While we investigate the higher
self of the world, we investigate our own higher selves. It is
not possible to agitate for occultism. Only someone who really
wants to fulfil the conditions of the higher development must
also pledge himself to explain what occultism prescribes for
such high development. Hence, the real occult direction of
theosophy should not be confused with that which one often
calls theosophy externally. It concerns methods proved for
centuries. It is left to the free will of every human being
when he wants to reach the goal; hence, one cannot object that
he is an outsider.
The
higher development to which every human being can reach takes
place slowly and gradually. He lives always in the visible
world. You all live not only in the sensuous world, but mental
and spiritual forces and events surround you here. These
spiritual and mental worlds are there for someone whose
spiritual and mental eye is opened. The methods are available
to open the spiritual and mental eye of the human being
generally. Then he lives only for these worlds; for it is
something different to live in these worlds and to perceive in
these worlds. The human being lives also in these worlds at
night, but he does not perceive them because he still lacks the
organs. The higher development lies in the fact that the soul
gets organs and thereby learns to perceive.
At
first, any higher recognising arises at night. While for the
only sensually perceiving human being darkness spreads at
night, the darkness is illuminated for the mentally perceiving
one. There is a light, which can illuminate the world, even if
no sun is there, which does not make the table discernible,
however, the mental facts. This is the astral light. If you
have soul organs, your soul is not blind, and then the human
soul can see the astral light where the eyes saw the figure
before.
The
astral light illuminates the soul as the sunlight illuminates
the body during the day. Everything that should be developed in
the human being exists as a rudiment in him, as well as the
human embryo has rudiments of eyes and ears, the rudiments of
clairvoyance are in the soul. However, as the human embryo
cannot yet see the physical world, the spiritual and mental
rudiments must also be developed in the human being. He is an
embryo in the mental world now, actually. What does not see the
mental and spiritual will see it later. There the consideration
begins, what does this soul do during sleep? — The soul
is not passive there, even if it does not see. The forces of
the physical human being wear themselves out in the course of
the day, but the human soul works during sleep on the recovery
of the physical forces. Because the soul is occupied with
itself, it has no free strength at its disposal to develop
organs anew. However, these forces must pay to form something
new; thereby something is taken away from the human body. The
human spirit has built up his physical body gradually; the soul
forms the tools gradually, which the human being uses. The soul
works in the same way if the physical body is worn out. During
sleep, it fixes everything again.
If
you use the forces of sleep different, you must compensate it.
The harmony of the forces can substitute everything that gets
lost in the struggle of the forces. Because the human being
feels, thinks, and wills erratically today, where he works
perpetually, where he follows any intention, in the job, with
every sensation, his forces wear out due to this struggle. If
then he intends to take away certain soul forces from his body,
he must atone for them with certain performances taking place
harmoniously. Hence, the inner development provides particular
virtues to start with, so that the strength that is taken away
from the body is replaced by rhythm. These virtues are: control
of thoughts and actions, impartiality, endurance, equanimity,
trust in the whole surroundings.
Today, the human being is given away to any idea; however, he
must be someone who controls his thoughts. Then he gets rhythm
in himself. To accomplish actions from own initiative, to
decide to act in such a way that the action is his very own,
this produces such a calmness in him that is necessary for the
soul. Endurance, standing firmly and certainly, enduring pain,
grief, and joy. Further, on, the human being must acquire the
biggest impartiality. He is worn out by nothing more than, if
he approaches the negative aspects of the things. This causes
disharmony and at the same time, he is exhausted. A Persian
legend is authoritative that reports to us how Christ Jesus and
his disciples once saw a rotting dead dog lying by the wayside.
The disciples asked the master not to waste his time with the
dog, the animal were too ugly. However, Christ looked at the
dog and said which nice teeth the animal has. He looked here
for the beautiful in the ugly thing. Any affirmation animates,
any negation exhausts and kills. Not only because a moral
strength belongs to it to turn to the positive side of a thing,
but also because any affirmation animates and makes forces of
the soul free and certain.
In
such an age like ours, nervousness also prevails. Nervousness
and negative criticism belong together. The provided virtues
are there to release higher forces for the human being. Such
virtues, which should make the lower life rhythmical, give the
soul forces, so that it can dedicate itself to the higher
development. This inner development proceeds completely
quietly.
I
would like to tell some of the matters, which still belong to
it. These matters were once the secret of the occult schools,
but now they are informed because of certain reasons. If a
human being has prepared his soul by such exercises, he is
referred to any teacher whom he will find when he should find
him. Then he goes through different stages of learning and must
use the forces that he has released for the higher soul
life.
The
first thing is that a single opinion is worth nothing at all.
The human being as an advanced pupil has thoroughly to overcome
his personal opinion, the expression: I believe this or that
about that.
However, the advanced pupil must understand not only the
foolishness of the materialist, but also go through the good
reasons in himself, which the materialist can have for himself
to understand how somebody could get around to becoming a
materialist. He will find that all human beings where they say
yes to the things, that is where they recognise the positive
side, are mostly right; where they say no, that begins which
the advanced pupil must learn to overcome. He must have got to
know the reasons and the content of any worldview not only
logically, but he must also have lived with it. He must put
himself in the soul of any sceptic. The higher forces do not
awake unless the pupil does know what can be argued against
anything. Who has gone through this also rouses forces in his
soul, which come definitely.
He
must then overcome any superstition; not only the superstition
of the African fetishist, but also that of the sophisticated
European. Everybody knows the effects of hypnosis. Our European
professors, for example, Wundt (Wilhelm W., 1832-1920,
physician, physiologist, and philosopher), explained hypnotism
saying that certain cerebral parts were not well supplied with
blood. However, this is nothing else than the superstition of
the African. In this way, you could disprove all materialistic
theories that speak of certain cerebral parts only. Even if
Haeckel is a great naturalist, it must be clear to everybody
that that which this naturalist asserts about these matters is
the purest superstition. The pupil must overcome all forms of
superstition.
The
third is the knowledge of the illusion of the personal self,
while the human being persuades himself that he can find the
higher life in himself. If he has reached this, he is ripe for
the second stage. He has to go through the illusion of the
personal self; he must recognise its authorisation to get rid
of it in so doing. The next is that everything must become a
symbol to him, “All that is transitory is only a
symbol” (Faust II). One has to regard anything as
a metaphor, a simile of that which it expresses. The single
flower, even the single human being must become a metaphor for
him; then he feels forces roused in his soul. — If he has
learnt for a while to regard the things as metaphors, then he
has to learn that the human being is a small world that nothing
is in him that does not correspond to the world outdoors. A
deep sense is in the Germanic mythology where we are told that
from the giant Ymir the whole world is formed.
He
must get to know how every organ is connected with the world,
and then he is able to proportion his own organism. Walking
through the world, he is not aware how his organs are connected
with the world. He has to learn this. The Eastern occultist
even teaches a quite special sitting posture, so that the pupil
is also externally in a right relation to the world.
Further, on, he has then to learn — this may only be
mentioned here — to regulate something consciously that
nature regulates, otherwise, in him without his aware
assistance. This is the respiratory system at first. If the
human being wants to develop higher, his breathing has to
become adequate to the big developmental processes. In a
strictly prescribed way, he has to inhale, to hold his breath,
and to exhale. If the human being regulates his breathing from
the spirit, he spiritualises his breath, his life air. With it,
he rises from hatha yoga to raja yoga, the royal yoga.
Then the highest comes, the exercises of meditation and
contemplation, the life of the human being within himself. If
he has prepared himself and has practiced in such a way, if he
has made his life rhythmic, he is completely ripe for leading
an inner life. There are three stages of meditation. It can be
organically integrated in the rhythmic respiratory process. At
first, he has to start from the sensory world, so that he can
distract himself from the external world and from its various
external impressions. Taking in hand his whole attention
independently helps him in the higher development. If he is
able to master his attention in such a way, he must be able to
become engrossed completely in the object of his attention, to
add nothing else; only one thought must live in him. It is the
best if his teacher gives him particular tasks according to his
individuality. If he has reached that, he is not distracted if
a gun fires a bullet beside him. Then he has to leave the
object of his reflection, but to maintain the activity. This
brings him in the highest worlds.
If
he accomplishes this, he attains that condition, which
occultism calls dhyana, after he has thought through the
object, however, has then dropped it, and lives then in the
activity only. He can leave this condition immediately; then
his inner eye awakes.
He
learns to practice the forces of his thinking using external
objects. However, he does not come fairly far; he reaches a
world, which looks like a kind of skeleton of the higher world.
Now, he has to develop a feeling of particular intensity from
the object, again excluding all others. Thus, he must be able
to feel something quite certain if he has a crystal in his
hand; he must feel something if he has an octahedron in his
hand. He gets a feeling that one can have towards the lifeless
world. We compare the lifeless rock to the living, blood-filled
being and say to ourselves, this has sensuousness; however, the
water-clear rock is without desire.
If
I am able to feel how the stone left its desire, how it has
become pure and chaste, and
If
I know how to become engrossed in this feeling, so that the
world dies around me and
If
I let only this feeling live in me — may it be the
feeling from the crystal, from the animal, or the human being,
and
If
I can then leave the object, and go back in the same way as
just now and come into the state of dhyana,
Then I notice that the feeling is not only a feeling, but that
it starts becoming light, that feeling starts becoming a light
phenomenon. In such a way, that appears which one perceives as
a form of thought that one should better call a form of
feeling.
These are single concepts I wanted to give you today. There
have always been teachers who gave the single individuality
instructions, tasks suitable for him. Any human being has his
own name in the spiritual world; he is even more individual in
it than in the physical world, and this own individuality must
be taken into consideration carefully, especially in the higher
stages concerning higher development. Hence, only a teacher can
give what is necessary.
I
have today given the first steps of that which one calls
recognising the self. If the human being learns to feel the
objects round himself, and the objects take on colours, which
become pictures, then he sees his world of feelings round
himself. He must face himself objectively, and then he crosses
the threshold where he perceives himself with all that which he
is and not yet is. The first guardian of the threshold stands
there before us who shows us, thou art that!
Anybody must learn to recognise himself, because he gets world
knowledge by self-knowledge. However, nobody is allowed to take
self-knowledge for knowledge of god. Hence, one could read at
the gate of the Delphic temple, recognise yourself (gnothi
seauton)! If one has attained self-knowledge, one enters the
innermost sanctum of the world where the divine forces prevail
and spiritual knowledge is given. If the own inside feels
connected with the world inside where one can only speak of
inner development, if the human being approaches this knowledge
worthily and not in frivolous way or with base motives, then he
attains it. He gets what can develop his humanity more and more
and makes him a worthier member in the development of humanity.
However, nobody has to strive for higher knowledge only on his
own. The human being shall develop, increase his forces, and
collect knowledge only to become a servant of the whole
universe.
Thus we become servants within the world as a whole, and only
in this sense, one should advance to higher knowledge.
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