Steiner builds a comprehensive understanding of human nature: physical bodily nature; soul qualities; spirit being, or I-being; and the higher spiritual aspects. This leads us to Steiner's description of the human being as sevenfold:
-Material, physical body
-Ether body, or body of life forces
-Sentient soul body
-Mind soul
-Spirit-filled consciousness soul
-Life spirit
-Spirit body

In the next section, Steiner offers an extraordinary overview of the laws of reincarnation and the principles of karma, as we pass from one life to the next. This prepares us for the third section, in which he shows the various ways in which we live-during life on earth and after death and in the three worlds of body, soul, and spirit.

Finally, we are given a succinct description of the path of knowledge, along which each person can begin to understand the marvelous and harmonious complexity of the psycho-spiritual worlds in their fullness.

Contents:
Foreword by Michael Holdrege
Prefaces by Rudolf Steiner
Chapter 1: The Essential Nature of the Human Being:
The Bodily Nature of the Human Being
The Soul Nature of the Human Being
The Spirit Nature of the Human Being
Body, Soul, and Spirit
Chapter 2: Destiny & the Reincarnation of the Spirit
Chapter 3: The Three Worlds:
The Soul World
The Soul in the Soul World after Death
The Country of Spirit Beings
The Spirit in Spirit Country after Death
The Physical World and Its Connection to the Worlds of Souls and Spirits
Chapter 4: The Path to Knowledge
Related Reading
Index