90. EL, Berlin, 10-24-'11
Great seriousness should
reign in esoteric life. An esoteric lesson should be something sacred,
something that we're entrusted with, and we should never take it to be
something ordinary. Probably none of us were aware of the necessary
seriousness when we asked to be taken into this esoteric circle. We
should place this seriousness before our soul ever more now and try
with all of our might to make a connection with the spiritual world,
that we can do through an esoteric training, so that we don't
fall back into everyday life. One should look upon all exercises that
are given to us as ones that come from the masters of wisdom and of
the harmony of feelings. In esoteric life one should pay particular
attention to egoism. We often tell ourselves that we're doing
something selflessly, or we're unaware that we hate or envy
someone, and as an esoteric we think that we should tell him the
truth or should not have to take this or that from him. When such
feelings arise we should realize that we're living in great
delusions that are always caused by egoism. Such feelings always
become manifest with a feeling of warmth that goes through the warmth
ether part of our life body and also works on the physical body
through the blood.
We must realize that such
feelings have a harmful effect on world evolution. The hierarchies who
have the task of regulating karmic connections then get Luciferic beings
to destroy these effects by working harmfully right down into the
physical body.
An icy cold feeing goes
through us when we see our wickedness, whereas we get a warm feeling
from satisfied passions when we don't have self-knowledge. A
clairvoyant can see them in mostly human shapes.
A man is often more
untruthful than he realizes. Many say: I don't really have any dishonesty
in me, I have discarded that entirely. But this dishonesty is often
so slight that we're usually not aware of it. Say that we read
that there's going to be a theosophical lecture in some city
and we decide to go there We don't stop to think that a dear
friend lives in that city whom we would like to see again, or that
there'll be a party there that we want to go to. We think that
we only want to go there because of the lecture, whereas there are
other reasons.
Our education may have
gotten us to the point where we don't tell any big lies, but we may still
have the desire to appear better than we are or to conceal the truth
if it would make us look bad. All of this has a harmful effect on all
world events. Such dishonesties work on our astral body, then on the
life body's light ether and then on our physical nerves.
Azazel makes us aware of
all such dishonesties. He and the beings he leads mostly have human heads
with raven's wings. With egoism, envy, and hate when we wake up we
have a feeling of disgust that must be ascribed to our
doppelganger's action, whereas one who tends towards dishonesty
wakes up with a choking, scratchy feeling in his throat. He'll
feel as if he was being pinched by pincers and tortured by a thousand
arms. Azazel and his hosts do that. And if we sense his action in the
way indicated, it should make us realize how deeply entangled in lies
and dissimulations we still are.
A third thing is indifference
and dullness with respect to spiritual worlds. Many pupils listen to an
esoteric lesson, but what's given doesn't find an echo in
them. They can't get away from ordinary, daily life. They
can't raise themselves spiritually or occupy themselves with
spiritual thoughts. Others are curious and would like to see or
experience something in the spiritual world, and they mediate without
studying regularly because they're too lazy to do so. This
works directly on the ego, from there on the astral body, then on the
life body's chemical ether and then on the body's glands
and fluids. Azael is at work in this. Azael and his hosts only want
to bring about good effects in nonesoterics by working on them in a
supplementary way, and not so that he makes them sick. The effects go
deeper in an esoteric, and he's always supposed to be aware of
his complete feeling of responsibility towards himself and the
world.
On awakening, a dull esoteric
will feel like he's drowning in a flood, which feeling will be all
the stronger the more he gives himself up to everyday sensory
life.
An esoteric should always
be watching himself. It doesn't hurt if he sometimes broods about
himself. That's the only way he'll understand
what's suggested to us at the end of every esoteric lesson by
the masters of wisdom and of the harmony of feelings:
In
the spirit lay the germ of my body.
And the spirit has imprinted in my body
The eyes of sense,
That through them I may see
The lights of bodies.
And the spirit has imprinted in my body
Reason and sensation
And feeling and will,
That through them I may perceive bodies
And act upon them.
In the spirit lay the germ of my body.
In my body lies the germ of the spirit.
And I will incorporate into my spirit
The super-sensible eyes
That through them I may behold the light of spirits.
And I will imprint in my spirit
Wisdom and power and love,
So that through me the spirits may act
And I become a self-conscious organ
Of their deeds.
In my body lies the germ of the spirit.
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