The Path of the Soul After Death: The Community of the Living and the Dead As Witnessed by Rudolf Steiner in His Eulogies and Farewell Addresses

Rudolf Steiner spoke frequently about the soul's continued existence beyond death, and about the importance of establishing a new kind of community that unites spiritually active souls and endures beyond death.

Peter Selg shows how Steiner commemorated the dead, the words he chose to use and his descriptions-sometimes in great detail-of the inner processes involved. He makes clear both how Steiner's own connections to the deceased shaped what he said and how his words were intimately related to their new stage of existence. Thus he not only recapitulated a particular soul's biography, but also assisted that soul on its path after death.

Realizing that the true depth and meaning of Steiner's words about those who have died cannot be understood except against the background of what happens to the soul after death, Dr. Selg dedicates the second part of his book to a stunningly clear and detailed account of anthroposophical research into the process of dying and the soul's path after death. "The moment of having died," for Rudolf Steiner, as for the poet Rilke, is the "consummate event" of a human life. It is held constantly in view by the soul after death and filled with beauty, grandeur, and a sunny-bright warmth related to Christ.

Peter Selg was born in 1963 in Stuttgart and studied medicine in Witten-Herdecke, Zurich and Berlin. Until 2000, he worked as the head physician of the juvenile psychiatry department of Herdecke Hospital in Germany. Peter Selg is now director of the Ita Wegman Institute for Basic Research into Anthroposophy (Arlesheim, Switzerland) and professor of medicine at the Alanus University of Arts and Social Science (Germany). He lectures extensively and is the author of numerous books.