"Truths cannot be transmitted simply as stable dogmas. Truths are always of a given moment and, at each moment, must be grasped anew. This demands at each moment a renewed activity in relation to the human gift of understanding." -- Jörgen Smit (from the foreword) The goal of this study is to cultivate the experience of living, intuitive thinking, such as we experience with every new understanding. As Kühlewind puts it, this unique contribution to practice of anthroposophy has a twofold purpose: "to stimulate working with spiritual science through exercises, and to stimulate independent new formulations of its content on the basis of experience." Working with Anthroposophy will help guide beginning students and inspire longtime students of the path opened up by Rudolf Steiner. As with all of Kühlewind's works, this book opens new insights with each reading.

3 selected lectures by Rudolf Steiner This is one of those books that can change your life. Radical, thought-provoking, and indeed mind-boggling, it leads to a completely new way of looking at what it means to be human--a spiritual being in a universe that itself is not just physical, but psychic and spiritual as well. These three previously untranslated lectures are a masterly introduction to what Rudolf Steiner means by "Anthroposophy." They explain why Steiner describes this path--which means literally "the wisdom of the human being"--as one that "unites what is spiritual in the human being with what is spiritual in the universe." Steiner begins by describing what happens when we die. He shows the relationship between our physical life on Earth and the etheric, astral, and spiritual life of the cosmos. He also explains how physical lives are completely interwoven with cosmic existence, and how the "miss-ing links" in evolution are spiritual in nature. Steiner then demonstrates what he calls the "dilettantism" and "soullessness" of mainstream psychology. He points out that, since the second half of the nineteenth century, the idea of the soul has been lost and that, consequently, understanding of our inner lives is without a sure foundation. A very different view emerges, however, from a truly spiritual perspective. In the third lec-ture, Steiner takes as his guide our three states of being--waking, dreaming, and sleeping. He describes in detail what happens in these three states and how each is bound up with our lives as physical, psychic, and spiritual beings. With the profound insights in this book, the world becomes a much larger, richer, and more exciting place to live.

Published in 1904 (CW 10) "Not everyone can immediately achieve spiritual vision; but the discoveries of those who have it can be health-giving life nourishment for all. The results of supersensible knowledge, when properly employed in life, prove to be not impractical, but rather, practical in the highest sense.... The acquisition of higher knowledge is not the end, but the means to an end; the end consists in the attainment, thanks to this knowledge, of greater and truer self-confidence, a higher degree of courage, and a magnanimity and perseverance such as cannot, as a rule, be acquired in the lower world." This is the classic account of the modern Western esoteric path of initiation made public by Steiner in 1904. He begins with the premise that "the capacities by which we can gain insights into the higher worlds lie dormant within each one of us." Steiner carefully and precisely leads the reader from the cultivation of the fundamental soul attitudes of reverence and inner tranquility to the development of inner life through the stages of preparation, illumination, and initiation. Steiner provides practical exercises of inner and outer observation and moral development. By patiently and persistently following his guidelines, new "organs" of soul and spirit begin to form, which reveal the contours of the higher worlds thus far concealed from us. Steiner in this important work becomes a teacher, a counselor, and a friend whose advice is practical, clear, and effective. The challenges we face in life require increasingly deeper levels of understanding, and Steiner's text helps readers to cultivate the capacities for such insights and places them at the service of humanity. This is Steiner's most essential guide to the modern path of initiation he advocated throughout his life. It has been translated into many languages and has inspired hundreds of thousands of readers around the world. How to Know Higher Worlds has been admired by some of the most brilliant minds of our time. "The methods by which a student is prepared for the reception of higher knowledge are minutely prescribed. The direction he is to take is traced with unfading, everlasting letters in the worlds of the spirit where the initiates guard the higher secrets. In ancient times, anterior to our history, the temples of the spirit were also outwardly visible; today, because our life has become so unspiritual, they are not to be found in the world visible to external sight; yet they are present spiritually everywhere, and all who seek may find them." Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and Its Attainment is a translation from German of the written work Wie erlangt man Erkenntnisse der höheren Welten? (GA 10).

6 lectures, Berlin, March 24-June 7, 1905; 2 lectures, Nov. 7, 1905 & Oct. 22, 1908; Questions & Answers, 1904-1922 (CW 324) The point, line, plane and solid objects represent the first three dimensions, but a kind of reversal of space is involved in the ascent to a fourth dimension. Steiner leads us to the brink of this new perspective--as nearly as it can be done with words, diagrams, analogies, and examples of many kinds. In doing so, he continues his lifelong project of demonstrating that our objective, everyday thinking is the lowest rung of a ladder that reaches up to literally infinite heights. The talks in this series and the selections from the question-and-answer sessions on many mathematical topics over the years are translated into English for the first time in The Fourth Dimension. They bring us to tantalizing new horizons of awareness where Steiner hoped to lead his listeners: Topics include: ∞ The relationship between geometric studies and the development of direct spiritual perception ∞ How to construct a fourth-dimensional hypercube ∞ The six dimensions of the self-aware human being ∞ Problems with the theory of relativity ∞ The Trinity and angelic hierarchies and their relationship to physical space ∞ The dimensional aspect of the spiritual being encountered by Moses on Mt. Sinai This volume is a translation from German of Die vierte Dimension Mathematik und Wirklichkeit (GA 324a).

"You should not have any mystical ideas about meditation, nor should you think it is easy. Meditation must be completely clear, in the modern sense. Patience and inner soul energy are needed, and, above all, it depends on an act that no one else can do for you: it requires an inner resolve that you stick to. When you begin to meditate, you are performing the only completely free activity there is in human life" (Rudolf Steiner). This completely revised edition provides an ordered sequence of statements by Steiner on the development of higher, suprasensory knowing --Imagination, Inspiration, and Intuition. Nine chapters take the reader from the idea of inner development, through the cultural and evolutionary need for higher knowing, and then to examples of the practices and inner gestures required by this work. Steiner describes the necessary steps and stages, always insisting on the free, individual, and cognitive character of anthroposophic spiritual research. This essential inner guide is for anyone on a path of true spiritual development.

Start Now! offers an extensive and representative sample of Steiner's spiritual instructions and meditative practices, including meditation instructions; mantric verses; daily, weekly and monthly practices for the development of soul qualities; karmic exercises and meditations for working with the dead, the angelic hierarchies and our guardian angel.

"The anthroposophical community seeks to lift human souls into supersensible realms so that they may enter the company of angels." --Rudolf Steiner Sergei Prokofieff traces the three stages of heavenly preparation of Anthroposophy--the "spiritual thunderstorm," the Michael School in the Sun sphere, and the "imagination-based cultus" in the spiritual word nearest the Earth. These events involved the nine spiritual hierarchies, associating them with the karma of the anthroposophic movement. The author goes on to elaborate the tasks of the Anthroposophical Society and indicates how these are connected with the spiritual hierarchies, the Michael movement, the Grail mysteries, the work of new group souls, and the "Foundation Stone Meditation." He shows that, in an esoteric sense, the General Anthroposophical Society was created so that people could learn to work with the gods. This is a vital booklet for all those who care deeply about the future of the Anthroposophical Society and the proper evolution of humanity.

These lectures provide an excellent introduction to some of the leading themes of anthroposophy. Steiner carefully corrects certain misunderstandings that had arisen regarding his spiritual-scientific research and demonstrates how anthroposophy has nothing whatever to do with mysticism or spiritualism; nor is it simply a revival of ancient esoteric teachings. Rather, it is a genuinely modern spiritual teaching for Western humanity that builds upon the achievements of science and develops its exact methodology further into the investigation of spiritual realities through the awakening of higher organs of perception.

"If such authentic souls, such honest anthroposophists can be found...then an upward movement and dynamic will arise. If such souls do not appear, then decadence will take its inexorable downward course.... Today humanity stands before a great crisis: either it will see all civilization collapsing into the abyss, or else spirituality will raise civilization up by the power of the Michael impetus, through which the Christ impetus works, thus continuing, enriching and sustaining it." During 1924, the last full year of Rudolf Steiner's life, he gave a series of urgent, sometimes impassioned, talks to members of the Anthroposophical Society about their karma and its relationship to contemporary culture, referring in particular to the vital task of renewing civilization and preserving it from the threat of decline. Steiner's words reveal a great gathering of forces to do spiritual battle for the soul of humanity. He presents a striking panorama in which anthroposophists are compelled to broaden their vision--to see true esoteric and exoteric anthroposophic work as a living yeast that can leaven all culture. To awaken members of the Anthroposophical Society to the significance of their task, Steiner could see that it was essential for them to understand the various karmic threads that form the fabric of the anthroposophic movement. Such recognition--of both difference and unity--offers strength of diversity, which easily leads to division if it remains unconscious and unrecognized. In the lectures and excerpts in The Karma of Anthroposophy, Rudolf Steiner speaks of an unprecedented convergence of two specific groups of souls with the anthroposophic movement: the Platonists and the Aristotelians. Thus, a conflict of approaches forms the karmic background, whereas today's task calls for unity based on love and knowledge--to work with the Archangel Michael and Christ in the face of Ahriman, materialism, and the possibility of social collapse and decadence. Given the challenges we face today, it is urgent for those who embrace spiritual science to study, absorb, and take to heart the substance of this critically important material.