The Etheric Body's Liberation: Esoteric Development and Inner Transformation

GA 266II — 26 February 1912, Munich

Esoteric Lesson

Record A

It is quite natural that our esoteric lectures become more complicated over the years, building on those that have been given before. As our esoteric movement continues to grow, certain disadvantages become apparent, above all that it is becoming increasingly widespread. The ideal would be to have a small group that strives for ever greater depth. Now, one can counteract this superficiality by encouraging new members to turn with confidence to older members who have been listening to these lectures for years and to let them tell them about them. It would be good if some people curbed the chattiness they devote to external matters and instead thought more about spreading the esoteric teachings in our circle on the one hand and taking them in on the other. When so many of our members place their trust so exclusively in one person—primarily in me as the more or less karmic instrument for spreading these teachings—this is not right. The younger members should turn to the older members with confidence in personal and everyday matters and only seek my advice on questions of esoteric development. Trust is a factor that plays a major role in the life of the Lodge, and the ability to give advice grows in those who are asked for it. We also have many doctors in our movement whom I trust completely, as can be observed at any time. Our members could turn to them for advice on many health issues. There is a particularly strong esoteric life here, and exemplary work is being done. Of course, this gives rise to some disadvantages, especially [due to] the arrival of those who do not realize how serious and sacred esoteric life is. For someone who has once devoted themselves to esoteric life, it should be impossible for them to even think of leaving for external reasons, because this would prove how little serious their decision was from the beginning. For some, from the moment they become esotericists, karma creates a peaceful destiny so that they can make their exercises the center of their lives. Others encounter more events that they cannot reconcile with their esoteric life, sometimes to such an extent that their esoteric life suffers. The ideal would, of course, be if we could radiate our entire lives from our esoteric center, if we always kept our eyes fixed on it. Something that is very harmful to esoteric development is, above all, the unchecked, superficial, and therefore objectively incorrect criticism that we often direct at each other or at our fellow human beings. I am not saying that criticism is wrong, but it should always refer to a thing and not to persons, simply because we do not like their manner.

Our exercises may seem simple, but they have a stronger effect on us than anything else we encounter in life. What do they do? They are designed to loosen and draw out our etheric body from within. In our exercises, we will one day find that we can no longer see, hear, or feel, and this happens through the loosening of the etheric body. There are now many methods of bringing this out, but such external methods that are not based on meditation are harmful to the organs, because the etheric body is pushed back from the outside, for example by the eyes, and these then suffer as a result. Through meditative withdrawal, only enough forces are loosened so that enough remain to maintain the vital functions. When we enter this state of not hearing, etc., we have left our physical body. However, many of us have been doing these exercises for years and have not yet succeeded. Why is that? Before leaving the body, one is overcome by an uncomfortable feeling, and the human being instinctively resists it. There is nothing he resists as much as the departure of the etheric body from the physical body. Thinking prevents this from happening. It is almost like a reflex movement that immediately pulls one back when this feeling comes over them. There is a very specific reason for this resistance. When the student has achieved sufficient intensity to leave the body, he suddenly realizes what a sublime, wonderful temple this body is with all its organs, and when he then looks at himself, at what has gone out, he sees that he is an ugly worm, and this worm resists leaving the body; it is that which resists because it is horrified by its own ugliness. And then we realize how infinitely long the path to perfection still is.

Through our exercises we gain a power, and that power should flow from within us to the outside. But some people say: Nothing flows out of me. This is not surprising if they do their exercises casually and without sufficient intensity, and place many everyday interests far above their esoteric work.

The first feeling we have when the etheric body relaxes is a heaviness in the brain and throughout the physical body, which we perceive as a weight that does not belong to us. We perceive this marvelous structure, which is the highest part of ourselves, as transitory and fragile. We have made it that way. It has been perfected by the divine beings from Saturn, and the Saturn and Sun forces within it are the building forces that would preserve it. But with the lunar forces, the astral, and the earth forces, the I, we have brought in something that turns these forces outward in order to convey perceptions to the I through the sense organs. In the course of schooling, the human being now perceives his senses as a destructive force, as a poison stored in his organism. As the astral body and the ego became integrated, the nervous system, the brain, and the senses had to be transformed so that they could now receive from outside what had previously flowed through them from inside to outside. At this moment, the human being comes to understand death, its true cause, and this was called in the ancient mysteries: standing at the gate of death.

The ego must now make amends for everything it has done wrong and perfect all its bodies so that we become true human beings. The term “human being” is often not used in the high sense that actually underlies it, but the esotericist should always regard it as his highest aspiration to become a human being.

Thus, in Him whose name is so holy that we cannot utter it, we must let all imperfection die, in order to be reborn in perfection, in the Holy Spirit.

Record B

On the four sentences of the Egyptian initiation:

I. Feel your body as if it were weights hanging from you, feel it as if it were becoming something.
II. The esotericist should not engage in superficial criticism. The esotericist must learn to be silent and trust his older brothers and sisters. He should do his exercises diligently and faithfully. And what is the result of this?

1. Recognizing what one sees, the physical body as a temple and a miracle of the gods.
2. Recognizing ourselves as a hideous worm which, when it dwells in the body, makes this body so unclean.