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Spiritual Life Now and after Death Edition 2 Revised

Forming Our Destiny in the Physical and Spiritual Worlds (CW 157a)

Paperback
August 2013
9781621480303
More details
  • Publisher
    SteinerBooks
  • Published
    9th August 2013
  • ISBN 9781621480303
  • Language English
  • Pages 150 pp.
  • Size 5.5" x 8.5"
$17.00

6 lectures, Berlin, November 16–December 12, 1915 (CW 157a)

Rudolf Steiner delivered these lectures near the end of 1915 and the beginning of World War I, when the issue of death and destiny weighed on the minds of many in Europe. He describes, from a spiritual perspective, the process of crossing the threshold of death to life in the spiritual world; the soul’s experience immediately after death; and the process of forming one’s destiny, or karma, while we remain on Earth and later in the spirit world. Steiner also discusses the importance of our connection with those who have died and how love and reverence to the memory of the dead must be united with our love for the physical world, and how we can strengthen ourselves through meditation.

In the final lecture, given on December 21, Steiner stresses the esoteric importance of the thirteen nights of Christmas and how we can consciously affect our future karma during that time.

This edition includes “The Dream Song of Olaf Åsteson,” a Nordic poem (discussed in lecture 6) that describes in pictorial language the deep mysteries of the Christmas nights.

C O N T E N T S:

1. Spiritual Life Now and after Death
November 16, 1915

2. The Formation of Destiny
November 18, 1915

3. The Subconscious Strata of the Soul Life
November 20, 1915

4. The Physical and Spiritual Worlds
December 7, 1915

5. Subconscious Impulses of the Soul
December 14, 1915

6. Today’s Spiritual Darkness
December 21, 1915

7. “The Dream Song of Olaf Åsteson”

This book contains 6 of the 7 lectures originally published in German as Schicksalsbildung und Leben nach dem Tode (CW 157a) by Rudolf Steiner Gesamtausgabe. Spiritual Life Now and after Death is a fully revised edition of The Forming of Destiny and Life after Death (Garber, 1989).

Rudolf Steiner

Rudolf Steiner (b. Rudolf Joseph Lorenz Steiner, 1861–1925) was born in the small village of Kraljevec, Austro-Hungarian Empire (now in Croatia), where he grew up. As a young man, he lived in Weimar and Berlin, where he became a well-published scientific, literary, and philosophical scholar, known especially for his work with Goethe’s scientific writings. At the beginning of the twentieth century, he began to develop his early philosophical principles into an approach to systematic research into psychological and spiritual phenomena. Formally beginning his spiritual teaching career under the auspices of the Theosophical Society, Steiner came to use the term Anthroposophy (and spiritual science) for his philosophy, spiritual research, and findings. The influence of Steiner’s multifaceted genius has led to innovative and holistic approaches in medicine, various therapies, philosophy, religious renewal, Waldorf education, education for special needs, threefold economics, biodynamic agriculture, Goethean science, architecture, and the arts of drama, speech, and eurythmy. In 1924, Rudolf Steiner founded the General Anthroposophical Society, which today has branches throughout the world. He died in Dornach, Switzerland.