95. EL, Hannover, 1-1-'12
Yesterday we got to the point in our esoteric training where we place
our doppelganger outside us. It's verily not a pleasant feeling
when we see all of what we previously had in us unconsciously
objectively before us, which then accompanies us wherever we go. We
heard that it's a Luciferic being, Samael, with his hosts who
brings the doppelganger out of us. From this, one sees that Luciferic
beings also do good things and not always bad ones. If we always
carried our defects in us unconsciously, we could never become aware
of the destructive, ruinous things that they do in our body and in
the whole cosmic substance. As long as Samael hasn't brought
our defects out from within us, as long as we don't see them
objectively before us as our doppelganger, so long the Gods
graciously keep us from seeing the ruinous, destructive force of
jealousy, hate, envy and other passions and emotions that we stream
out into our environment. A clairvoyant sees that these passions tear
something down in our physical body and in the cosmos'
substance, whereas the good stimulates upbuilding forces. So
basically Samael is a blessing for development. He shows us our inner
nature all the more accurately the more seriously we take our
training in hand. We then see defects objectively which we
hadn't paid any attention to previously. Now we'll become
increasingly disgusted with them and they'll spur us on to get
rid of them.
An
esoteric will then unavoidably have a feeling as if he couldn't
get any air, as if he would suffocate. This feeling arises because
the pupil begins to pay attention to his subtle soul stirrings,
especially to the untruthfulness that slumbers potentially in every
man. We don't mean the cruder lies and hypocrisies that lower
natures generate, but the finer nuances that we don't notice
through our superficiality and which we often do not even
acknowledge. As an example, let's assume that someone learns
that a theosophical lecture is going to be given someplace. He
thinks: That's something good, I'll go there — but at
the same time he thinks that he'll meet someone there whom
he'd like to be with. Nevertheless, he tells himself that this
isn't the main reason so that he imagines he's really
going there on account of the lecture.
Such
things happen every day; one lies to oneself and doesn't want
to notice it. But now the untruths we hadn't noticed crowd into
our consciousness so we think that they'll suffocate us.
Another
example will show us how much men live on the surface in all of their
actions and even in their duties. (Followed by the example of
teachers who were supposed to be tested a second time and
didn't know what was in the textbooks that they used every
day.) This superficiality spreads out over our whole soul life, so
that we don't even see the lies that we tell ourselves.
When we
first begin to exercise we might not notice much progress; thoughts
about daily life stream to us from all sides. It'll take a long
time for us to notice any results from our exercises and for a second
being called Azazel to begin to draw our attention to our
superficiality, Samael and Azazel must both bring something out of
us, but a third being must bring us something. He must bring us a
longing for a higher, spiritual life. The next example shows us
what's meant by this. A scientist who's fired by a desire
for knowledge and would like to know everything suddenly finds
himself at a wall, so that he can't press on with his
intellect. In most cases he'll say: A human intellect can go no
further, and he will resign himself to this. But others who feel that
their soul is more alive will look further and will be led to
spiritual science. There they think they can investigate beyond the
limits that materialistic science has set up before them. But as soon
as they tread an esoteric path, they'll feel like they're
drowning. For as a man presses ever deeper into esotericism, the
limits move ever further apart until he gets to a point where
everything moves away and he's standing over an abyss. He feels
no support anymore, everything disappears under his feet. It's
only by going further on the path, by eagerly continuing the
meditations that it'll dawn on him that maya must fall away
before he can know the truth, spiritual reality; Azazel brings us
this knowledge; he preserves man from spiritual or intellectual
drowning.
Then
there's a fourth being, Mehazael. He awakens the feeling in us
and makes us aware that we're bound to time and space. The best
way to clarify this is to place a condition before our soul that many
of us have experienced. This is when we wake up in the morn and feel
burdened by duties and worries that are like chains that the new day
brings with it. This goes together with another one of wanting to
shake off the chains that hold us fettered to this burden that is all
the harder to bear since we know that we are powerless against it,
that we must end ourselves. Here Mahazael shows us our karma.
We'll be able to bear this burden more easily as soon as we
tread the esoteric path. Mehazael shows it to us so that we
don't resist it uselessly; for thereby we would only make our
karma worse instead o shaking if off. And so in the end, these four
Luciferic forces are a blessing for us.
We saw
that every time we let our rage and hate run wild and we don't
master our passions, we pulverize something in us and in cosmic
substance, into which our feelings, sensations and thoughts flow
continuously. Thereby we not only harm ourselves — we create
karma for our environment. So far we've only studied karma
theoretically. We'll now see how much deeper and more
complicated karma's action is.
To
become aware of the whole action of these four beings in us, we must
keep on meditating strongly. In addition to meditating on the rose
cross and on other things and esoteric verses that are given us, we
should try to meditate on feelings and sensations, which is much
harder. For instance, if we meditate on sympathy and immerse
ourselves completely in this feeling, warmth will stream through us;
meditation on antipathy will arouse a cold feelings in us. For
instance, if we first meditate on the rose cross and then on a strong
will impulse, an impulse for a good deed, we'll then see an
inner light and feel a stream of warmth. Our exercises and
meditations aren't successful right away; it goes slower with
some and faster with others, depending on development and karma One
will succeed after fifty times, another will take a whole lifetime,
but we should wait patiently and go forward courageously. Where did
the sun get the power to appear at the same place every morn and
radiate its light?
An
esoteric's life should become quite different from what it was
before. He's really leading two lives — one that gradually
crumbles and dies, and another one that gives him light out of the
spirit from which he came. Wise masters in ancient mysteries
expressed the dying of the old man and the flaming up of the new man
through the Christ spirit in the words: Ex Deo nascimur,
In … morimur, because Christ's name was too sacred to
utter. Per Spiritum Sanctum reviviscimus.
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