3. Initiation-Knowledge—New and Old

If we take the etheric body of the human being, it is actually the carrier of thoughts. It is true that the etheric body is the carrier of the immediately present thoughts in general, and also the cause that thoughts can pass over into memories and be retrieved from the memories again; it is only necessary for the earthly human being that this etheric body is, as it were, stuck inside the physical body. This is necessary for the reason that man as an earthly being needs a kind of resistance for that which takes place in the etheric body. Just as we as earth beings cannot walk in the air, but need a ground on which we walk, but the ground does nothing at all to make us walk, it only gives us the resistance - so it is with what goes on in the etheric body of man. The whole play of thought, the whole course of thought takes place in the etheric body; but the thought would not come alive in the waking man if there were not a resistance, if every movement of living thought did not come up against the physical body. It does nothing, but it gives resistance. This makes the person in waking consciousness aware of the thoughts that take place in the etheric body.