The Wrong and Right Use of Esoteric Knowledge

The first English edition of the following lectures (published under the title Secret Brotherhoods) has been out of print for many years and the publication of this revised edition is to meet constant requests from students of Anthroposophy.

The lectures were given by Rudolf Steiner to an audience familiar with the background and terminology of his anthroposophical teaching. He constantly emphasised the distinction between his written works on the one hand and, on the other, reports of lectures which were given as oral communications and were not originally intended for print. For an intelligent appreciation of the lectures it should be borne in mind that certain premises were taken for granted when the words were spoken. “These premises,” Rudolf Steiner writes, “include at the very least, the anthroposophical knowledge of Man and of the Cosmos in its spiritual essence; also what may be called `anthroposophical history,' told as an outcome of research into the spiritual world.”

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A brief list of publications in English translation relevant to the contents of these lectures will be found at the end of the volume, together with a summarised plan of the Complete Centenary Edition of Rudolf Steiner's works in the original German.