Near the end of his life, Rudolf Steiner took up the task that was his special destiny to bring knowledge of reincarnation and karma to the West. Consequently, he gave more than eighty lectures in 1924 to explicitly reveal the destinies of various individuals from one life to the next. He explained how the general laws of karma work in individual cases and revealed many details of the karmic streams of the members of the Anthroposophical Society. These volumes constitute an immeasurable contribution to the understanding of reincarnation and karma and the tasks of the Anthroposophical Society in connection with the Archangel Michael. In volume five, Steiner discusses the difference between moon karma and sun karma, the influences of Christian and Islamic thinking, the transformation of inner human qualities from one life to the next, and much more.

The Spiritual Revolution of the twentieth century -- the "New Age" -- is unimaginable without the spiritualist movement and the formidable personality of Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, the creator of the Theosophical Society. Without these two, the work of Rudolf Steiner, G. I. Gurdjieff, Hazrat Inayat Khan, Sri Aurobindo, and C. G. Jung, and could not have been what it was.

In this fascinating volume on the Theosophical movement, Rudolf Steiner, one of its leading participants, tells his own story in his own words about the origins of the theosophical movement in spiritualism and somnambulism, as well as his own version of Anthroposophy's relation to Theosophy. Steiner also relates Theosophy to its historical ground in Western esotericism, above all Rosicrucianism. He reveals events from the seventeenth century that led to the emergence of Freemasonry and other secret societies, the hidden history of the creation of Theosophy itself in the nineteenth century, and conflicts that are still reverberating between Anglo-Saxon and Germanic occult streams today.

Rudolf Steiner taught that, beginning in the twentieth century, Christ would reappear in the etheric (or 'life') realm of the Earth. And he made two further predictions in relation to that event: firstly that, before such a reappearance could take place, mankind 'must have passed through the encounter with the Beast, which will appear in 1933'; and secondly that, around the end of the twentieth century, 'Sorath' - the Sun Demon - would oppose people's personal vision of the etheric Christ. Taking these statements as his starting point, Tradowsky examines the question of evil and its relationship to Christ. He describes Sorath and his activities, asserting that knowledge of this elusive and terrible being helps individuals to overcome him; and he explains the role of the 'Apocalyptic Beast' in relation to Ahriman - or Antichrist - and the latter's physical incarnation on earth. Intended for those with a close concern for anthroposophy, this book provides essential background information to understanding the events of our time and clarifying our tasks in relation to Christ, evil and the new millennium.

In this series of previously-untranslated lectures, Rudolf Steiner describes how myths and legends portray humanity's most ancient evolutionary and spiritual history. Folklore presents ancient mystical wisdom in the form of stories - clothed in pictures by initiates - that enable individuals to understand their content in a more intellectual form at a later time. Focusing on Greek and Germanic mythology, the lectures in the first part of this volume cover the chronicles of Prometheus, Daedalus and Icarus, Parzival and Lohengrin, the Argonauts and the Odyssey, and the heroic dragon-slayer Siegfried. From these focal points, Rudolf Steiner discusses a variety of themes - from the mysteries of the Druids and the founding of Rome to the esoteric background of Wolfram von Eschenbach; from good and evil and the unjust death sentence on Socrates to the significance of marriage. The second part of this book features lectures on the nature and significance of the musical dramas of Richard Wagner. Wagner's works, from his earliest attempts to his most mature opera Parsifal, are discussed from spiritual viewpoints. Although Wagner did not have a fully conscious awareness of the deeper meanings of his compositions, Steiner suggests that his shaping of Germanic legends was driven by an instinctive, creative and artistic certainty that accords with deep occult truths.

At the threshold that divides the elemental and etheric worlds, Are Thoresen encounters two spiritual entities - Vidar and Balder, 'guardians of the threshold' - whose task is to protect the spiritual border from uninitiated intruders. Building on previous reports, Encounters with Vidar offers startling new esoteric teachings, gleaned - through processes of spiritual knowledge - from these enigmatic gods. Here, Vidar and Balder emphasize the importance of clairaudience as opposed to clairvoyance (the latter particularly being open to attack from adversary beings). Through the process of working with the communications, the author begins to experience a transformation of his head chakras, leading to an awakening of 'spiritual ears'. Whilst clairvoyance is like reading the holy script, clairaudience is akin to hearing the holy script, he learns. --- Amongst the wealth of fresh insights revealed here are the 'fourth aspect of the soul' (or 'time-karma-Christ'); the task of eurythmy today; the whereabouts of the contents of the School of Spiritual Science; and the work of 'Vulcan beings' and other planetary entities. Thoresen offers reflections on his travels to western England (with its connections to Troy) and southern Spain (with its legacy of Moorish occupation). His intention is not to create new dogmas or beliefs, but to testify to the living reality of metaphysical dimensions of reality - and humanity's latent ability to access them.

Augustine's Early Thought on the Redemptive Function of Divine Judgement considers the relationship between Augustine's account of God's judgment and his theology of grace in his early works. How does God use his law and the penal consequences of its transgression in the service of his grace, both personally and through his 'agents' on earth? Augustine reflected on this question from different perspectives. As a teacher and bishop, he thought about the nature of discipline and punishment in the education of his pupils, brothers, and congregants. As a polemicist against the Manichaeans and as a biblical expositor, he had to grapple with issues regarding God's relationship to evil in the world, the violence God displays in the Old Testament, and in the death of his own Son. Furthermore, Augustine meditated on the way God's judgment and grace related in his own life, both before and after his conversion. Bart van Egmond follows the development of Augustine's early thought on judgment and grace from the Cassiacum writings to the Confessions. The argument is contextualized both against the background of the earlier Christian tradition of reflection on the providential function of divine chastisement, and the tradition of psychagogy that Augustine inherited from a variety of rhetorical and philosophical sources. This study expertly contributes to the ongoing scholarly discussion on the development of Augustine's doctrine of grace, and to the conversation on the theological roots of his justification of coercion against the Donatists.

Today, illness is almost universally regarded as either a nuisance or a grave misfortune. In contrast to this conventional thinking, Rudolf Steiner places the suffering caused by disease in a broad vista that includes an understanding of karma and personal metamorphosis. Illness comes to expression in the physical body, but mostly does not originate in it, says Steiner, and thus a key part of the physician's work involves gaining insight into the whole nature of an individual - his essential core being. From this perspective, illness offers us the opportunity for deeper healing. Throughout this volume Rudolf Steiner draws our attention to the greater scope of the smallest phenomena - even a seemingly insignificant headache. He casts vivid light on things we normally take for granted, such as the human capacity to laugh or cry, and in the process broadens our vision of human existence. The apparently mundane human experiences of forgetting and remembering are intrinsic to our humanity, for example, and have unsuspected moral and spiritual dimensions. Steiner's insights are never merely 'lofty' or nebulously 'spiritual' but time and again connect with the minutest realities of everyday life. In these 18 lectures, delivered on a weekly basis as part of an ongoing course covering 'the whole field of spiritual science', Steiner elaborates in detail on the diverse interplay of the human being's constituting aspects (physical body, etheric body, astral body and ego or 'I') in relation to rhythmic processes, developing consciousness, the history of human evolution, and our connection with the cosmos. Within this broad canvas, some of his themes acquire a very distinctive focus - such as vivid accounts of the 'intimate history' of Christianity, 'creating out of nothing', the interior of the earth, and health and illness. Other topics include: the nature of pain, suffering, pleasure and bliss; the four human group souls of lion, bull, eagle and man; the significance of the Ten Commandments; the nature of original sin; the deed of Christ and the adversary powers of Lucifer, Ahriman and the Asuras; evolution and involution; the Atlantean period - and even Friedrich Nietzsche's madness!

In a previously-unavailable series of talks to the general public, Rudolf Steiner builds systematically, lecture by lecture, on the fundamentals of spiritual science - from the nature of spiritual knowledge and its relationship to conventional science, the path of personal development and the task of metaphysical research, to specific questions on the mystery of death, the meaning of fairy-tales, the significance of morality and the roles of individual figures in human evolution, such as Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael and Jacob Boehme. At the time of these presentations, Steiner had already worked in Berlin for many years, and thus, '...could reckon with a regularly returning audience to whom what mattered was to enter ever more deeply into the areas of knowledge that were newly opening up to them' (Marie Steiner). As a consequence - and through 'a series of inter-connecting lectures whose themes are entwined with one another' - he was able to communicate a coherent and challenging spiritual perception of reality, based on his personal research. Presented here with notes, an index and an introduction by Simon Blaxland-de Lange, the 14 lectures include: 'How is Spiritual Science Refuted?'; 'On What Foundation is Spiritual Science Based'; 'The Tasks of Spiritual Research for both Present and Future'; 'Errors of Spiritual Research'; 'Results of Spiritual Research for Vital Questions and the Riddle of Death'; The World-Conception of a Cultural Researcher of the Present, Herman Grimm' and 'The Legacy of the Nineteenth Century'.

'The present age needs to understand that human beings must hold the balance between the two extremes, between the ahrimanic and the luciferic poles. People always tend to go in one direction... The Christ stands in the middle, holding the balance.' - Rudolf Steiner These eleven lectures were given in post-war Stuttgart against a backdrop of struggle and uncertainty - not only within society at large but also within the anthroposophical movement. Rudolf Steiner and his supporters were working to introduce 'threefold' social ideas and - given Steiner's public profile - were coming under increasing personal and sometimes physical attack. Steiner responds to this turbulent situation by revealing the spiritual background to the forces of decline working in contemporary civilization. He speaks of retrogressive powers - spiritual beings referred to as luciferic or ahrimanic - that work directly into human culture, manifesting, for example, in what he refers to as the 'initiation streams' of Western secret societies, the Church-allied impulse of Jesuitism and the Bolshevik force of Leninism. The spiritual agents of adversity also encourage polarised thinking and false opposites such as East verses West, materialism and mysticism, or knowledge and belief. Only the threefold principle - represented by Christ - allows us to create a balance in the midst of these existential conflicts. This freshly-reworked translation is complemented with notes, an index and an introduction by Matthew Barton.

The time of Nazi dictatorship in Germany (1933-45) consistently stimulates more interest than any other period of human history, as witnessed by the countless books and other media on Adolf Hitler and his leading henchmen. What is the basis for this enduring fascination? And, does the abundance of available material help us truly to understand the phenomenon? In this clear-sighted study, Tautz concludes that there is an existential need for the human psyche to come to terms with the forces of destruction that broke out during the era of National Socialism. In an attempt to get to the essence of the phenomenon, he employs the method of 'historical symtomatology', as developed by the philosopher and scientist Rudolf Steiner. Through these means, '...the historical process is perceived as the physiognomic expression of spiritual forces'. By viewing events as symptoms, the outer facts become transparent to the hidden influences that lie behind them, and occult aspects are revealed. Tautz focuses on the degenerate elements that inspired National Socialism - their meaning, nature and methods - and examines their manifestation in earthly events. He reveals the spiritual context in which these adversary, opposing forces erupted and attacked humanity - at a time when human consciousness had stepped over a new threshold. The Nazi functionaries and their spectral leader, whom he refers to as 'the Medium', willingly served these powers, whilst the bedazzled masses were largely passive. If we are serious about developing an egalitarian society today that corresponds to the present level of human evolution, he argues, we need to understand this period of tyranny in Germany at the deepest levels. In addition to Tautz's classic text, a new Appendix by Andreas Bracher brings the reader up to date with a survey of relevant literature on the theme as well as an insightful review of the Nazis' attitude to Rudolf Steiner and the anthroposophical movement he founded. Contemporary extracts from the Volkische Beobachter (the Nazi's house journal) indicate the viciousness and hatred directed towards Steiner and anthroposophy by the National Socialists.

In 1919 Rudolf Steiner spoke about the future physical incarnation of the being of Ahriman. This would take place before 'a part' of the third millennium had passed, and was inevitable - but it was also necessary that people were aware of this event and recognized it, for earthly culture would be destroyed if the world were to fall completely to Ahriman. The situation we find ourselves in today shows Ahriman's unmistakable signature: the rapid destruction of nature, zoonotic diseases and pandemics, huge social inequalities, and the overall dominance of high finance. In this short book Peter Selg presents a timely overview of the challenges we face, beginning with a pithy and concise survey of Steiner's commentary on Ahriman's incarnation and the conditions that would characterize it. This is followed by a study of Ahriman's depiction in the mystery drama The Souls' Awakening. Steiner's remarkable personification of Ahriman on stage - portraying his strategies and activities - provides vital instruction for humanity. Selg concludes with an evaluation of 'the Battle for Human Intelligence' taking place in contemporary culture through materialistic ideas such as transhumanism. In their recent book Covid-19: The Great Reset, for example, Klaus Schwab and Thierry Malleret propose wholesale economic, geopolitical, environmental and technological revisions to society - ideas that need to be understood and confronted in human thought and consciousness. The Future of Ahriman is a crucial aid to comprehending our times.

How awake are we to our inner being, our true nature? How much self-knowledge do we really have? In relation to our intrinsic self, we can easily feel like a novice. In truth, we face a long journey before we can fully understand ourselves - and we are equally unpractised in relating to our 'shadow' and inner wounds. The path described in this book is an inward one, concerned with strengthening our individuality. Based on life-long research, Karsten Massei has created a valuable workbook for knowing and healing ourselves. In a series of short chapters, he explains the interplay and tensions between the human individual and the nature of our 'inner and cosmic child'. Both are complex entities but are directly related; both are deeply connected with our destiny. Our experiences with our inner child are often still in the earliest stages - but cultivating a relationship with her, noticing her, holding conversations with her, is vital, and offers us ever deepening experiences. As our insights expand, our frailties, deficiencies and inner wounds become apparent. The being of the inner child wants to educate us to become inwardly truthful and authentic. Only honest engagement with the traumas and vulnerabilities of our soul will enable a true picture of ourselves to arise. Child of the Cosmos contains surprising perspectives arising from the author's personal experiences, opening up a clear path of personal development. The text is complemented with seven special meditations to assist us in engaging with the challenges ahead.