{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 112/1909-06-25/p021","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"In order to understand this preparation we must visualize the same phenomenon on a smaller scale. Let us suppose a man starts on the path to spiritual cognition in any one of his incarnations—that is, he carries out some of the exercises (to be described later) which render the soul more and more spiritual, more receptive to what is spiritual, and guide it toward the moment when it bears the higher, imperishable ego that can see into the spiritual world. Many experiences are passed through before that moment arrives. One must not imagine that anything pertaining to the spirit can be hurried: everything of the sort must be absolved with patience and perseverance. Let us suppose, then, that someone starts a training of this kind. His aim is the birth of the higher ego, but he only succeeds in reaching a certain preliminary stage. Then he dies; and in due time he is born again. Here one of two things can happen: either he can feel the urge to seek a teacher who will show him how he can rapidly repeat what he had previously passed through and attain to the higher stages, or else, for one reason or another, he does not take this way. In the latter case, as well, the unfolding of his life will often be different from that of the lives of other men. The life of one who has trodden the path of enlightenment at all will quite of itself provide something resembling effects of the stage he had already reached in his previous incarnation. He will have experiences of a different nature, and the impression of these on him will be different from that received by other men. Then he will attain anew, by means of these experiences, to what he had previously achieved through his efforts. In his former incarnation he had to strive actively from step to step; but now that life brings him as a recurrence, so to speak, what he had once acquired through effort, this approaches him from without, as it were; and it may be that he will experience the results of his previous incarnations in quite a different form.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"2. Living Spiritual History","site_heading":null,"date":"1909-06-25","location":null,"word_count":363,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/112/1909-06-25/p021","alignment_confidence":"high","alignment_reason":"beads:length","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"established","translator":"Samuel and Loni Lockwood","identified_edition":"AP1948","book_title":"The Gospel of St. John","publisher":"Anthroposophic Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA112/English/AP1948/19090625p02.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["English"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/112/1909-06-25/p021"},{"lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/112/1909-06-25/p021","paragraph_aligned":true}],"record":{"record_type":"unknown","scope":"volume","note":"How this text was taken down (shorthand transcript, listeners' notes or manuscript) is not on record here. Unknown is not an assurance of a stenogram: check the edition's own notes before resting an argument on one word.","evidence":null,"evidence_translation":null,"evidence_source":null},"german_anchor":{"de_prefix":"1909-06-25","de_passages":[{"locus":"GA 112/1909-06-25/p025","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/112/1909-06-25/p025"}],"bead_confidence":"high","pairing_state":"proposed","verified":false,"length_check":{"de_words":548,"en_words":539,"ratio":0.98,"partial":false},"correspondence":"established","note":"English passage numbering is edition-relative, so the same number need not name the same paragraph in the German. The German original passage(s) above are the edition-invariant anchor — fetch them (lang='de') to verify wording before quoting across editions."},"paired_german":{"status":"paired","german":[{"locus":"GA 112/1909-06-25/p025","passage_number":25,"text":"Nehmen wir an, ein Mensch tritt den geistigen Erkenntnispfad in irgendeiner Verkörperung an, das heißt er macht irgendwelche von den Übungen - von denen wir auch noch sprechen werden -, welche die Seele immer geistiger und geistiger gestalten, immer empfänglicher machen für das Geistige und sie dem Zeitpunkt entgegenführen, wo sie das höhere, unvergängliche Ich gebiert, das in die geistige Welt hineinschauen kann. Viele Erlebnisse macht der Mensch bis dahin durch. Nun darf man sich nicht vorstellen, daß der Mensch irgend etwas übereilen kann in geistiger Beziehung. In Geduld und Ausdauer muß so etwas durchgemacht werden. Nehmen wir also an, ein Mensch beginnt mit einer solchen Entwickelung. Sein Ziel ist die Geburt des höheren Ich. Aber er bringt es nur bis zu einer gewissen Stufe. Er erreicht gewisse Vorstufen zu der Geburt des höheren Ich. Nun stirbt er und wird dann wiedergeboren. Jetzt kann zweierlei eintreten, wenn ein solcher Mensch, der in einer Verkörperung eine gewisse geistige Schulung durchgemacht hat, wiedergeboren wird. Entweder er kann den Drang fühlen, sich wieder einen Lehrer zu suchen, um sich zeigen zu lassen, wie er rasch das wiederholt, was er vorher durchgemacht hat, und wie er zu den entsprechend höheren Stufen hinaufkommt. Oder er sucht aus irgendwelchem Grunde keinen solchen Weg. Auch da wird sich sein Leben oft anders gestalten als bei einem andern Menschen. Bei einem Menschen, der etwas von dem Erkenntnispfad bereits durchgemacht hat, wird das Leben auch ganz von selbst etwas bringen, das sich ausnimmt wie Wirkungen der Erkenntnishöhe, die er schon in der vorhergehenden Verkörperung erreicht hat. Er wird anderes erleben, und die Erlebnisse werden einen anderen Eindruck auf ihn machen, als es bei anderen Menschen der Fall ist. Und dann wird er an solchen Erlebnissen aufs neue erreichen, was er früher durch sein Streben erlangt hat. In der früheren Inkarnation mußte er von Punkt zu Punkt strebend tätig sein. Im nächsten Leben, wo ihm sozusagen wiederholentlich das Leben selbst bringt, was er früher erstrebt hat, da tritt es gleichsam von außen an ihn heran, und es kann sein, daß er in ganz anderer Form die Ergebnisse der früheren Inkarnation erlebt. So kann es geschehen, daß ihm schon in der Kindheit in irgendeinem Erlebnis etwas entgegentritt, was auf sein ganzes Gemüt einen solchen Eindruck macht, daß die Kräfte, die er sich in der vorherigen Inkarnation angeeignet hat, wieder in ihm erstehen. Nehmen wir an, ein solcher Mensch habe in einer Inkarnation eine bestimmte Stufe der Weisheitsentwickelung erlangt. In der nächsten Inkarnation wird er wiedergeboren als ein Kind wie jeder andere. Aber mit sieben oder acht Jahren macht er irgend etwas Schweres durch. Das hat auf seine Seele die Wirkung, daß alles das wieder herauskommt, was er sich früher als Weisheit errungen hat, so daß er jetzt wieder auf der früher erreichten Stufe steht und von da zu der nächsten hinanschreiten kann. Nun nehmen wir weiter an, er bemühe sich jetzt, um einige Stufen weiter zu kommen. Er stirbt wieder. In der nächsten Inkarnation kann es wieder so gehen. Wieder kann ein äußeres Erlebnis an ihn herantreten, das ihn gleichsam auf die Probe stellt, wodurch dann wieder zutage kommt zuerst das, was er in der vorvorigen Inkarnation sich erarbeitet hat, dann das, was er in der vorigen Inkarnation erlangt hat, und dann kann er wiederum eine Stufe höher steigen.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":548,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/112/1909-06-25/p025"}],"english":["GA 112/1909-06-25/p021","GA 112/1909-06-25/p022"],"method":"length","confidence":"high","correspondence":"established","length_check":{"de_words":548,"en_words":539,"ratio":0.98,"partial":false},"pairing_state":"proposed","verified":false},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":0.99,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":6326,"original_word_count":6406,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Samuel and Loni Lockwood","identified_edition":"AP1948","book_title":"The Gospel of St. John","publisher":"Anthroposophic Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA112/English/AP1948/19090625p02.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 112/1909-06-25/p025"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"high","note":"Every load-bearing name in the German counterpart appears in this English passage. That is a check on NAMES only: a translation can keep every name and still reverse who acts on whom, change a number, or soften a claim. Read the German for anything you intend to rest an argument on."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}