Massimo Scaligero (1906-80) was a student of Zen, of Yoga, and of his spiritual science of Rudolf Steiner, but he came to independent conclusions based on his direct spiritual experience.Drawing on his autobiography as a structure for the book, Massimo Scaligero shows how an in-depth experience of Yoga leads powerfully into the esoteric path of the Rose Cross, or Rosicrucianism.

The Rose Cross meditation is central to the western - Rosicrucian - path of personal development as presented by Rudolf Steiner. Steiner repeatedly referred to the meditation as a 'symbol of human development' that illustrates the transformation of the human being's instincts and desires. These work unconsciously in the soul, and in thought, feeling and will. Through personal development, the 'I' - the essential self - can gain mastery over these unconscious forces of the soul. The Rose Cross meditation features the red rose as an image to which the student, via specific means, aspires. To the plant is added the black cross which, pointing to the mystery of death and resurrection, provides a symbol of the higher development of the human I. The metamorphosis of the roses and the cross into the symbol of the Rose Cross is brought about by the student's inner efforts, creating an entirely new image. This becomes the starting point for further steps along the meditative path.The Rose Cross meditation is the only pictorial meditation whose content and structure Steiner described in such detail. In this invaluable book, the editor has drawn together virtually all Rudolf Steiner's statements on the subject, arranging them chronologically within the motif of each chapter. His words are supported by commentary and notes.

This book is a critical English translation of a Gnostic Classic. It is presented in a bilingual format (English side by side with the original Spanish). It details some wonderful knowledge about the power of the word and speech. This edition also includes an Editor's Appendix to help the reader further grasp its contents."Language is not simply a medium or vehicle of expression between man and man, but also between soul and soul.""Language creates Laws and unites Races.""It is an obligation to study the origin of Language in general, but in order to approach this goal, it is also necessary to find the origin of the Word.""The Word or Logos is not [just] a mouth that speaks, but an ear that hears and an eye that sees [and reads] between the lines."

Rudolf Steiner often emphasized the importance of meditation practice for the self-development of students of Anthroposophy. In his writings and lectures, he offered various instructions for approaches to meditation and for strengthening qualities needed to unfold our latent spiritual capacities. In this accessible book, Massimo Scaligero—a lifelong student of Rudolf Steiner and Spiritual Science—systematically illumines Steiner’s practices, building on the foundation of our human constitution and explaining how and why these practices work. Such efforts take place in the world and with the people around us and restore us to our true condition: “Initiation is the restoration of the spirit’s original state, despite its human incarnation.” This text by Massimo Scaligero should be read and thought deeply, but also acted upon. It will be an aid to all those who wish to take the path of initiation through Spiritual Science. A Practical Manual of Meditation is a translation from Italian of Manuale Pratico della Meditazione (Teseo, Rome, 1973/2005).

What happens when a former Zen Buddhist monk and his feminist wife experience an apparition of the Virgin Mary? “This book could not have come at a more auspicious time, and the message is mystical perfection, not to mention a courageous one. I adore this book.”—Caroline Myss, author of Anatomy of the Spirit Before a vision of a mysterious “Lady” invited Clark Strand and Perdita Finn to pray the rosary, they were not only uninterested in becoming Catholic but finished with institutional religion altogether. Their main spiritual concerns were the fate of the planet and the future of their children and grandchildren in an age of ecological collapse. But this Lady barely even referred to the Church and its proscriptions. Instead, she spoke of the miraculous power of the rosary to transform lives and heal the planet, and revealed the secrets she had hidden within the rosary’s prayers and mysteries—secrets of a past age when forests were the only cathedrals and people wove rose garlands for a Mother whose loving presence was as close as the ground beneath their feet. She told Strand and Finn: The rosary is My body, and My body is the body of the world. Your body is one with that body. What cause could there be for fear? Weaving together their own remarkable story of how they came to the rosary, their discoveries about the eco-feminist wisdom at the heart of this ancient devotion, and the life-changing revelations of the Lady herself, the authors reveal an ancestral path—available to everyone, religious or not—that returns us to the powerful healing rhythms of the natural world.

8 lectures, Dornach, December 2-22, 1917 (CW 179) With a single observation, Rudolf Steiner can sometimes outline a radically new reality that changes everything. Here, he introduces these extraordinary lectures by proposing that the boundary between the physical and spiritual worlds "lies right in the middle of the human being." One indication of this boundary may be found in what science mistakenly differentiates as the sensory and motor nerves, which for Steiner, do not represent two kinds of nerve functions, but rather a gap, or interruption, through which soul, spiritual reality incarnates, and through which the spiritual world participates in the natural, physical world. This gap allows us to experience inwardly and take part in not only the outer world, but also in the spiritual world and the world of those who have died. It also functions as the boundary between the conscious and subconscious. The lectures that loosely follow this introduction go into the vast field of the dead and the spiritual worlds and the many ways that these influence and become involved in human and earthly life. Steiner shows how the living and the dead (along with the whole spiritual world) are intimately interrelated. History itself is the result of this interweaving activity, whose influences "flow right into our daily lives." Realizing "this feeling of being together with the dead" is essential for human development. The reader's understanding of the influence of those who have died on human destiny deepens with each lecture, as Steiner shows how this reality becomes existential--a matter of personal decision--through the Archangel Michael's great action in 1979, when he assumed responsibility for the guidance of humankind. Thus, together with Michael and the whole spiritual world, those who have died call upon us to change our consciousness. The Influence of the Dead on Destiny is the first complete English translation from the German of Geistige Wesen und Ihre Wirkung Geschichtliche Notwendigkeit und Freiheit. Schicksalseinwirkungen aus der Welt der Toten. Band III (GA 179).

This treatise, though logically formulated and accessible, proposes a task that few can probably actualize. Its thoughts are assembled so that retracing them becomes the proposed experience. This experience, insofar as it is realized, is not merely one of many possibilities, but an experience of our inner essence, which the spirit demands of us at the present time. The treatise cannot be refuted philosophically, since it is based on a kind of experience that must be achieved if we wish to have a means by which to question it. However, those who are able to achieve it begin to live within a thinking that penetrates the world. It is the thinking that is the truth of all theories and of none, because it is their pre-dialectical substance. By experiencing the thoughts presented, we can experience the power of “concentration,” or the tangible presence of the spirit—the path of living thinking, the transcendence present but not cognized in each thought that we think.