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to indicate how a certain recrudescence of outer and inner experiences is to be seen when
we bring our time into connection with the Egyptian.
We have seen that in the spiritual worlds there exist mysterious forces, to which there
correspond certain other forces in the physical world which effectuate the appearance of
these repetitions. Thus do these resurrections of outer and inner experiences originate. In
the middle between these stands the Greco-Latin period, during which the Christ
appeared upon the earth and the Mystery of Golgotha took place. It was also pointed out
that not only the external evolutionary relationships on the physical plane had changed,
but that also the relationships in the spiritual world had become different. I have
described how the soul was in the Egyptian time, when it looked upon the gigantic
pyramids, how different it was when it reincarnated in the Greco-Latin period, and how
different it is in our time. We have seen that not only does this occur, but that also for the
period between death and a new birth, in kamaloka and Devachan, there takes place a sort
of progress or transformation, so that the soul does not experience the same thing when it
enters into kamaloka or Devachan from an Egyptian, a Greek, or a modern body.
Externally the world of the physical plane alters, but progress also occurs in the spiritual
world so that the soul always experiences something different there.
It is primarily from the standpoint of this  beyond that today we shall consider the
mighty event of the Christ's appearance on our earth. We shall approach in a much deeper
way the question, What significance has the advent of the Christ on our earth? What
significance has the Christ's appearance for the dead souls, for the life on the other side,
the spiritual side, of existence? For this purpose we must explore many different things
that affected souls in the Egyptian period both within and beyond the physical plane.
From our studies of the earlier great epochs of earth evolution we can derive that the
Egypto-Chaldean period furnishes a mirroring in knowledge and experience of what
happened in the Lemurian time, of what happened on the earth during and after the
departure of the moon. What men experienced then, they experienced again as a memory
in what the Egyptian initiates gave them. The Egyptian initiate himself experienced
during his initiation events that man otherwise experiences only when he passes through
the portal of death. To be sure, the Egyptian initiate experienced this in a different way
than does the ordinary person who dies. He experienced it differently and in a much fuller
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way. It will be well for us now, as a basis for these considerations, to describe the essence
of Egyptian initiation in a few words. This initiation is essentially different from that of
the time after Christ, for through his advent initiation was fundamentally altered.
We have seen that men had to descend further and further into the material world, gaining
increasing interest in the physical world. In the same proportion, however, the experience
in the spiritual world between death and a new birth became more pale and shadowy. The
livelier man's consciousness became in the physical world, the more he enjoyed being
there, the, more he discovered the laws of the physical plane, the dimmer his
consciousness in the spiritual world became. The consciousness in the spiritual world
reached its low point in the Greco-Latin time. But even before man had fully descended
into these depths of matter, it had become impossible for him, within the physical body,
to experience completely what one must experience if, during the period between birth
and death, one seeks to gain insight into the spiritual world.
The initiation event may be briefly described, and it is the same for initiations before and
after Christ, although the conclusion is different. Initiation is nothing other than man's
gaining the capacity of developing organs of vision in his higher bodies. Today man sees
darkness when it is night; he is in the dark. This is because man has no organs of
perception in his astral body. As the eyes and ears have formed themselves into physical
organs of perception, so supersensible organs must be developed out of the higher
members and assimilated into them. This occurs through certain exercises of
concentration and meditation being given to the pupil. These exercises are performed [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]