"In healing processes or in the general growth of the body, the formation of bone or the formation of a tissue from a fluid is a sclerotic process. We can call it the formation of tissue from fluid growth, but technically it is sclerotic. Sclerosis, which is considered to be a disease process, is therefore a natural process in the body. Inflammation and infection that can kill you and sclerosis are both the body's natural healing processes. Steiner mentions this and asks, So, where does the illness come in? This is a really a very good question. The answer he gives is this: Illness is not in the body and its life forces. Illness is in the thoughts we bring to the body and the life forces. Illness is in the soul." Dennis Klocek makes this statement at the outset of this book to begin his theme of "consciousness and disease." He approaches virtually every aspect of the human bodies--the physical structures, forces, and processes; the soul's feeling life of desires and aversions and its role as mediator between our physical body and "I"; and the power of spirit and human "I"-being in illness and health. Each chapter is at once specific and encompassing as he takes the reader on a journey through the deeper realities of being human, exploring both material and spiritual science and connecting them to paint a picture of how and why we suffer illnesses and enjoy health. C O N T E N T S 1. Inflammation, Sclerosis, and the Human "I" 2. Catabolism, Anabolism, and the Life Forces 3. Secretion, Excretion, and the Circulatory System 4. Nutrition and Consciousness 5. Glands and the Heart 6. Nerve and Blood 7. Esoteric Embryo 8. The Senses and the Life Body 9. Digestion and Emotional Life 10. The Neurology of Imagination 11. Emotions and the Will 12. Remedies and Dysfunctions

8 lectures, Prague, March 20-28, 1911 (CW 128) Given the upsurge of interest in complementary therapies and treatments, medical researchers are gradually being pressured to reassess and expand their knowledge of the structure and organization of the whole human body. Despite advances in modern technology, there are vast areas of human physiological activity that remain undetectable to conventional scientific observation. Those processes, according to Rudolf Steiner, are related to spiritual forces and beings. In these revealing lectures, Steiner concentrates on the relationship between those forces and the human physical organs. In particular, he discusses the organs that make up our digestive and respiratory systems; the significance of "warmth" in the function of the blood and its effects on the I, or Ego; and the evolutionary process implicit in the formation of the spinal column and brain. He deals with all of this in a scientific way that will appeal equally to doctors and therapists, as well as students of Steiner's spiritual science. These talks--long out of print--are also remarkably accessible to the general reader. An Occult Physiology is a translation from German of Eine okkulte Physiologie (GA 128) The translator's name is unknown.

Reprint. Originally published: Los Angeles, Calif.: Philosophical Research Society, 1937.