On Meditation E-Book

Rudolf Steiner

• Herausgeber: Rudolf Steiner Press
• Kategorie: Ratgeber
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Seitenzahl: 73

Beschreibung

Meditating is a totally free undertaking; it is the epitome of an autonomous deed.' - Rudolf Steiner. Based on brief, pithy quotations from Rudolf Steiner's collected works, the 'spiritual perspectives' in this volume present core concepts on the subject of meditation. These brief extracts do not claim to provide exhaustive treatment of the subject, but open up approaches to the complexity of Steiner's extraordinary world of ideas. Some readers will find these fragments sufficient stimulus in themselves, whilst others will use the source references as signposts towards deeper study and understanding.

Leseprobe

RUDOLF STEINER (1861–1925) called his spiritual philosophy ‘anthroposophy’, meaning ‘wisdom of the human being’. As a highly developed seer, he based his work on direct knowledge and perception of spiritual dimensions. He initiated a modern and universal ‘science of spirit’, accessible to anyone willing to exercise clear and unprejudiced thinking.

From his spiritual investigations Steiner provided suggestions for the renewal of many activities, including education (both general and special), agriculture, medicine, economics, architecture, science, philosophy, religion and the arts. Today there are thousands of schools, clinics, farms and other organizations involved in practical work based on his principles. His many published works feature his research into the spiritual nature of the human being, the evolution of the world and humanity, and methods of personal development. Steiner wrote some 30 books and delivered over 6000 lectures across Europe. In 1924 he founded the General Anthroposophical Society, which today has branches throughout the world.

Rudolf Steiner was not concerned with systems. His aim was to suggest impulses towards finding and developing ways of living that would be worthy of humanity in the here and now. One aspect of this was his wish to intensify our awareness of existence as something that is not limited to our present life between birth and death. He never tired of reminding us that we are in reality spiritual entities. Through his written works and lectures Steiner urged us to take this hidden reality seriously, encouraging us in countless ways to develop an awareness of spirituality—a presence of mind that would enable us to recognize and do what is necessary in any given moment. Yet when faced with the voluminous dimensions of his work, it is easy to lose sight of this.

The ‘spiritual perspectives’ presented in this series assemble core ideas on specific subjects, as found in his complete works, with the aim of bringing mobility into thinking while also deepening the ability to understand and act. The brief extracts do not claim to provide exhaustive treatment of a subject. Their purpose is to open up approaches to the prodigious complex of Steiner’s work, so as to assist readers as they endeavour to gain their own understanding of his extraordinary world of ideas.

The source references are intended to serve as initial signposts. However, some will find the fragments sufficient in themselves—as valuable aids to making one’s way in the complex world that surrounds us.

ON MEDITATION

spiritual perspectives

RUDOLF STEINER

compiled and edited by Taja Guttranslated by J. Collis

RUDOLF STEINER PRESS

Rudolf Steiner PressHillside House, The SquareForest Row, RH18 5ES

www.rudolfsteinerpress.com

Published by Rudolf Steiner Press 2012

Originally published in German under the title Stichwort Meditation by Rudolf Steiner Verlag, Dornach, in 2010. This authorized translation is published by permission of the Rudolf Steiner Nachlassverwaltung, Dornach

© Rudolf Steiner Verlag 2010This translation © Rudolf Steiner Press 2011

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978 1 85584 293 9

Cover by Andrew Morgan DesignTypeset by DP Photosetting, Neath, West Glamorgan

CONTENTS

1. Why Meditate?

2. Prerequisites for Meditation

3. Basic Exercises

4. Meditating

5. Meditations

Notes

Sources

1. WHY MEDITATE?

To meditate—the only entirely autonomous activity

Do not think about meditating in a ‘mystical’ kind of way, but on the other hand do not be frivolous about it either. There must be absolute clarity in the way we go about meditating today. But it also calls for patience and an inner energy of soul. And above all else it involves something which none of us can give to another person, namely that one makes a promise to oneself and then proceeds to keep that promise. By beginning to work with meditation one is therefore carrying out the only entirely autonomous activity that is possible in our life as human beings. We have always tended towards freedom and have also performed a good many deeds that are free. But when we think about this we realize that in one way we are dependent on heredity, and in another on our upbringing, and in a third way on life as it is nowadays. Do ask yourselves to what extent you would be capable of summarily turning your back on all the things you have gained through heredity, through education and through life as such. So you can see that when we resolve to carry out a meditation every evening and every morning, in order gradually to gain insight into the supersensible world, it is possible every day for us either to do it or not to do it. There is nothing to push us in either direction. Indeed experience has shown that most of those who have approached the meditative life with lofty intentions very soon give up on the whole affair. Meditating is a totally free undertaking; it is the epitome of an autonomous deed.1

A waste of energy

Just as heat is wasted when it is allowed to dissipate into the environment, so in our culture do people waste untold amounts of the energy that comes into being in our life of thinking and feeling. What is daily lost in this way and allowed to flow into nothingness could be expended instead on gaining direct access to supersensible knowledge ... Our western culture is prone to allow us to waste vast quantities of energy and strength simply because here more than elsewhere in the world we generate thoughts. But almost all these thoughts are unchecked: there is no control over how they come about, no control over how they are developed further or passed on, and no control over how they are received. So they are lost without leading us to any knowledge for which we might be aiming.2

Dormant capacities

Capacities which could be used to gain knowledge about higher worlds lie dormant in every human being. Mystics, adherents of Gnosticism, theosophists have always spoken of a world of soul and a world of spirit both of which for them are just as present as is the world that can be seen with bodily eyes and touched with bodily hands. Listening to them as they speak we could say to ourselves at any moment: ‘I, too, may experience for myself what these people are talking about if I develop certain powers which at present still lie dormant within me. Surely it is purely a matter of how one sets about developing such capacities within oneself.’3

Principles of inner development

There is one principle in every esoteric science* which must not be overturned no matter what goal we are seeking to attain. Every esoteric schooling must impress it upon its pupils. The principle is: Every item of knowledge you seek merely in order to enrich your store of knowledge, merely in order to amass treasures, will cause you to stray from your path; every item of knowledge, however, which you seek in order to become more mature along the path that leads towards human refinement and towards the evolution of the world, this knowledge will take you one step further. This is a law that must be rigorously observed. None of us will be a pupil of the mysteries until we have made this law the guiding principle of our life. This true statement about spiritual pupilship may be summarized in the following brief sentence: Every idea that does not become an ideal will slay a force in your soul; every idea, however, which does become an ideal will create life forces within you.5

Meditation—keener thinking

Another way of describing meditation could be to call it keener thinking, thinking that is more intense, more highly developed. Meditation involves intensively focusing one’s consciousness on a single thought or on a sequence of thoughts ... and then working within that sequence of thoughts so strongly that the activity is no longer a matter of abstract, intellectualized thinking like that employed in ordinary science or ordinary life but becomes an activity of thinking which is so intense that, were we children younger than the age of seven, it would enter into our bodily organism where it would boil and bubble and seethe.6

Liberating thinking from the body