Category Archives: Lecture

Last Address

Festival, Insight, Lecture, Rudolf Steiner Quote, Upcoming Event

~George Mason

Greetings Dear Sisters & Brothers on this auspicious Eve of the Full Harvest Moon, coupled with the ancient Jewish celebration of Sukkot, which brings the community together for a unique opportunity to experience an amazing blend of Honoring the Ancestors, Giving Thanks, & opening to receive prosperity’s blessings…Yes, the season of in-gathering is upon us once again…Sweet with the seal of At-One-ment…

In the New Christian Mysteries this is also the Eve of The Feast Day of St. Michael & All the Heavenly Hosts. Referred to as Michaelmas, a season that really begins during the Perseid Meteor showers, is celebrated specifically on September 29th, & lasts until The Feast of All Hallows.

~hag

TODAY – 99 years ago – on 28 September 1924, Rudolf Steiner rose from his sick bed where he worked at the foot of his unfinished sculpture – the ‘Representative of Humanity’, to give what has been referred to as: THE LAST ADDRESS, GA 238, THE INDIVIDUALITY OF ELIAS, JOHN, RAPHAEL, NOVALIS. Rudolf Steiner died 6 months later on 30 March 1925.

On the eve of Michaelmas, Steiner gives a mysterious example of what is called ‘Spiritual Economy’ – which he had been revealing all thru 1923 in his ‘Karmic Relationships’ series – the idea that powerful individualities can share the results of their initiations which have developed their various bodies: physical, etheric, astral & I, with other worthy souls for the purpose of furthering human evolution.

In this last public lecture, he gives a truncated glimpse into the special relationship between John the Evangelist, who in earlier incarnations was Cain, Hiram Abiff, Christian Rosenkreutz, Count of St-Germain…& John the Baptist, who was the first man Adam, the Zealot Phinehas-grandson of Aaron & great-nephew of Moses, then the prophet Elijah, the painter Raphael, & the poet Novalis…

It is up to us now as part of the Centennial renewal to take up the threads.

Thru Steiner’s 5th Gospel we can understand that John the Baptist worked with all the apostles from the spiritual world after his beheading, becoming like the “overshadowing spirit of the disciples”

And in particular JB participated, along with other powerful individualities, in the first Christian initiation of a human being by Christ Jesus: the ‘Raising of Lazarus’ = An integration of the pure essence at the core of the ancient Mystery Schools with the New Christian Mysteries working simultaneously. And here we see this principle of ‘Spiritual Economy’ or as Marie Steiner called described it:  “incorporation secrets, the line of interception of individualities”. For while Lazarus was undergoing this new 4-day initiation, JB endowed Lazarus with his Consciousness Soul which he had achieved as Elijah, & the advanced level of his astral body as Spirit-Self. Bestowing on Lazarus the initiatory title John, which signifies the Air (Hebrew=Ruach) Initiation. Steiner describes the title John as “one who has awakened his higher self, who governs the occult forces of air”.

~Van Gogh

From the Last Address we hear: “At the rising of Lazarus, the spiritual being of John the Baptist, who since his death had been the overshadowing spirit of the disciples, penetrated from above into Lazarus as far as the Consciousness-Soul. The being of Lazarus himself, from below, intermingled with the spiritual being of John the Baptist from above. After the rising of Lazarus, this Being is Lazarus-John, the disciple whom the Lord loved. And he was then able to write the Gospel of John & the Book of Revelation”. ~Rudolf Steiner

This initiation of Lazarus-John, as a representative of future humanity, pre-figured on the micro-level the death & resurrection that Christ Jesus accomplished macrocosmically on Golgotha. Since this was such an important task, other powerful individualities not able to be mentioned at that time by Steiner in the Last Address, were involved:

The Being known as Zarathustra, who had incarnated as the Matthew Jesus, visited by his followers the 3 Magi, merging with the Nathan Soul of the Luke Jesus at age 12, who then left the body of Jesus of Nazareth at the Baptism by JB to allow the Christ to enter, worked now from the Moon Sphere, offering Lazarus his advanced etheric-body (Buddhi).

And it was Aristotle, who later became Rudolf Steiner, working with Michael from the Sun sphere at the Turning Point of Time, made his powers of Atman (Spirit-Man) available to Lazarus-John.

Christ himself bestowed the Higher “I”.

The Raising of Lazarus ~Juan De Flandes

Lazarus’ sister Mary Magdalene kept his physical body intact enough to rise from the grave (even though Martha his other sister said “by this time there is a bad odor…”) Mary worked thru the advanced power of her Sentient Soul to hold him grounded in the physical while he underwent the initiation.

Perhaps that is why some say ‘the Disciple who Jesus loved’ looked like a woman. Some say it was even Mary…

And so dear friends on this eve of Michaelmas thru the inspiration of Rudolf Steiner’s ‘Last Address’, as well as comments he made in connection to other incorporations, such as between Demetrius & Kaspar Hauser, which Steiner spoke about to Count Polzer-Hoditz a few weeks before he died, we can see that at the ‘Raising of Lazarus’ we are dealing with a new kind of Initiation where a human being stands before Christ, reaching from the earthly depths to the highest heavenly heights – Assisted thru the interception of spiritual organs of high initiates working from the Spiritual Worlds: John the Baptist, Zarathustra, Aristotle, & the Apostle of the Apostles Mary Magdalene.

May more threads of our evoultion continue to connect us in our seeking to be ‘Christ in me’.

~hag

28 September 2023 – “Speaking with the Stars”: The full moon closest to the equinox, or Harvest Moon – rises just before sunset. It’s the last of 4 full supermoons in a row in 2023. Also, on September 28, look for the full super Harvest Moon to be about halfway between the 2 planets, very bright Jupiter and golden Saturn.

Humanity and divinity | thehumandivinedotorg
William Blake

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

551 BC – Birthday of Confucius, Chinese teacher, editor, politician, & philosopher of the Spring &Autumn period of Chinese history

1203 – Deathday of Alanus ab Insulis, Theologian, poet, teacher at Chartres. Alan’s philosophy was a sort of mixture of Aristotelian logic and Neoplatonic philosophy. The Platonist seemed to outweigh the Aristotelian in Alan, but he felt strongly that the divine is all intelligibility and argued this notion through much Aristotelian logic combined with Pythagorean mathematic

 “Do not hold as gold all that shines as gold”

In the Anticlaudianus he sums up as follows: Reason, guided by prudence, can unaided discover most of the truths of the physical order; for the apprehension of religious truths it must trust to faith. This rule is completed in his treatise, Ars catholicae fidei, as follows: Theology itself may be demonstrated by reason. Alainus even ventures an immediate application of this principle, & tries to prove geometrically the dogmas defined in the Creed

Rudolf Steiner speaks extensively about this powerful Platonic individuality in many place such as: Karmic Relationships: Esoteric Studies – Volume III, lecture VI – THE SCHOOL OF CHARTRES

Giovanni Segantini - Wikipedia

1899 – Deathday of Giovanni Segantini,an Italian painter known for his large pastoral landscapes of the Alps. He was one of the most famous artists in Europe in the late 19th century. In later life he combined a Divisionist painting style with Symbolist images of nature. He was active in Switzerland for most of his life.

TODAY in 1924 – Rudolf Steiner gave his ‘Last Address’ in Dornach GA 238  ‘The Individuality of Elias, John, Raphael, Novalis’ with the Michael Meditation:

Springing from Powers of the Sun,
Radiant Spirit-powers, blessing all Worlds!
For Michael’s garment of rays
Ye are predestined by Thought Divine.

He, the Christ-messenger, revealeth in you —
Bearing mankind aloft — the sacred Will of Worlds.
Ye, the radiant Beings of Aether-Worlds,
Bear the Christ-Word to Man.

Thus shall the Heralds of Christ appear
To the thirstily waiting souls,
To whom your Word of Light shines forth
In cosmic age of Spirit-Man.

Ye, the disciples of Spirit-Knowledge,
Take Michael’s Wisdom beckoning,
Take the Word of Love of the Will of Worlds
Into your soul’s aspiring, a c t i v e l y !

1978 – Deathday of Pope John Paul I, born Albino Luciani, served as Pope until his sudden suspicious death 33 days later. His reign is among the shortest in papal history.

30 September 2023 – Our Annual Michaelmas Festival & Zinniker Farm Day – Biodynamic preparation making and Michaelmas 2023 – Food for Thought

The time for biodynamic preparation making is upon us. We will be making and burying the chamomile, yarrow and dandelion compost preparations. This offers hands on activity. We will be walking through grass and working in the soil. Please dress accordingly and be ready to get dirty.

After the potluck join Hazel Archer-Ginsberg in an experiential activity at the bon-fire called: Food for Thought –

Bounty: What spiritual gifts have you harvested in your life so far this year?
Farewells: What no longer serves? What is over? Say good-bye/ thank you.
Preserves: What will you keep as seed for the future?

Date: September 30th, 2023 at the Zinniker Farm
Time: 1:30pm, potluck dinner
Please bring a dish to share
Suggested donation: $15-25 for more info.

Bio~hag
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The Anthroposophic Movement

Lecture, Rudolf Steiner Quote
Baron Arild Rosenkrantz

Greetings friends – I shared in the last post how Sergei O Prokofieff affirmed my connection  to the Being of Anthroposophia, & a long time participant of ReverseRitual Steve Hale recalled a lecture by Steiner, which I quote in part below. In re-reading this, other important aspects caught my attention; specifically in regard to the difference between modern science & Spiritual Science.

“As long as so much of the present scientific mode of thinking is carried unconsciously into the anthroposophical movement it will not be able to make progress productively.

In particular, there will be a lack of progress as long as people believe that the current scientific establishment can be persuaded about anything without their first adopting a more positive attitude towards anthroposophy. Once they have done that, a dialogue can begin. Our task with regard to those who are fighting against anthroposophy today can only be to demonstrate clearly where they are not telling the truth. That is something which can be discussed. But of course there can be no dialogue about matters of substance, matters of content, with people who not only do not want to be convinced, but who cannot be convinced because they lack the necessary basic knowledge.

That, above all, is where the work needs to be done: to undertake basic research for ourselves in the various fields, but to do that from the core of anthroposophy…

The only proper course we can pursue is to tell the world what we have found through anthroposophy itself, and then wait and see how many people are able to understand it. We certainly cannot approach the world with the core material of anthroposophy in the hope that there might be a party or a person who can be won over.”

Baron Arild Rosenkrantz

Also what struck me was the idea that we must each come to our own understanding of Anthroposophy by consulting as free individuals with the Being of Anthroposophia as Steiner says.

Below are some other interesting quotes & also the link to the entire lecture which is worth studying.

David Newbatt

The Anthroposophic Movement, Lecture 7, The Consolidation of the Anthroposophic Movement, Dornach, 16 June 1923 https://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA258/English/RSP1993/19230616p01.html

Anthroposophists today must not think that they have only the same commitments which future anthroposophists will have when they exist by the million rather than the thousand. When limited numbers are active in the vanguard of a movement they have to show commitment of a much higher order. It means that they are obliged to show greater courage, greater energy, greater patience, greater tolerance and, above all, greater truthfulness in every respect. And in our present third stage a situation arose which specifically tested our truthfulness and seriousness. It related in a certain sense to the subject matter discussed at one point in the lectures to theologians. [ Note 5 ] Irrespective of the fact that individual anthroposophists exist, a feeling should have developed, and must develop, among them that Anthroposophia exists as a separate being, who moves about among us, as it were, towards whom we carry a responsibility in every moment of our lives. Anthroposophia is actually an invisible person who walks among visible people and towards whom we must show the greatest responsibility for as long as we are a small group. Anthroposophia is someone who must be understood as an invisible person, as someone with a real existence, who should be consulted in the individual actions of our lives.

Thus, if connections form between people — friendships, cliques and so on — at a time when the group of anthroposophists is still small, it is all the more necessary to consult and to be able to justify all one’s actions before this invisible person.

This will, of course, apply less and less as anthroposophy spreads. But as long as it remains the property of a small group of people, it is necessary for every action to follow from consultation with the person Anthroposophia. That Anthroposophia should be seen as a living being is an essential condition of its existence. It will only be allowed to die when its group of supporters has expanded immeasurably. What we require, then, is a deeply serious commitment to the invisible person I have just spoken about. That commitment has to grow with every passing day. If it does so, there can be no doubt that everything we do will begin and proceed in the right way…

As long as so much of the present scientific mode of thinking is carried unconsciously into the anthroposophical movement it will not be able to make progress productively.

In particular, there will be a lack of progress as long as people believe that the current scientific establishment can be persuaded about anything without their first adopting a more positive attitude towards anthroposophy. Once they have done that, a dialogue can begin. Our task with regard to those who are fighting against anthroposophy today can only be to demonstrate clearly where they are not telling the truth. That is something which can be discussed. But of course there can be no dialogue about matters of substance, matters of content, with people who not only do not want to be convinced, but who cannot be convinced because they lack the necessary basic knowledge.

That, above all, is where the work needs to be done: to undertake basic research for ourselves in the various fields, but to do that from the core of anthroposophy.

When an attempt was made after the war to tackle practical issues in people’s lives and the problems facing the world, that again had to be done on the basis of anthroposophy, and with the recognition that with these practical tasks in particular it was hardly possible to count on any sort of understanding. The only proper course we can pursue is to tell the world what we have found through anthroposophy itself, and then wait and see how many people are able to understand it. We certainly cannot approach the world with the core material of anthroposophy in the hope that there might be a party or a person who can be won over. That is impossible. That is contrary to the fundamental circumstances governing the existence of the anthroposophical movement. Take a women’s movement or a social movement, for instance, where it is possible to take the view that we should join and compromise our position because its members’ views may incline towards anthroposophy in one way or another; that is absolutely impossible. What matters is to have enough inner security regarding anthroposophy to be able to advocate it under any circumstances…

A society cannot be sectarian. That is why, if the Anthroposophical Society were standing on its proper ground, the we should never play a role. One repeatedly hears anthroposophists saying we, the Society, have this or that view in relation to the outside world: Something or other is happening to us. We want one thing or another. In ancient times it was possible for societies to face the world with such conformity. Now it is no longer possible. In our time each person who is a member of a society like this one has to be a really free human being. Views, thoughts, opinions are held only by individuals. The Society does not have an opinion. And that should be expressed in the way that individuals speak about the Society. The we should actually disappear…

There is something else connected with this. If this we disappears, people in the Society will not feel as if they are in a pool which supports them and which they can call on for support when it matters. But if a person has expressed his own views in the Society and has to represent himself, he will also feel fully responsible for what he says as an individual.

This feeling of responsibility is something which has to grow as long as the Society remains a small group of people. The way in which that has been put into practice so far has not succeeded in making the world at large understand the Anthroposophical Society as an eminently modern society, because this practice has repeatedly led to a situation in which the image which has been set before the public is we believe, we are of the opinion, it is our conception of the world. So today the world outside holds the view that the Society is a compacted mass which holds certain collective opinions to which one has to subscribe as a member. Of course this will deter any independently minded person…

But people will only be able to think in this direction if they radically discard the petty aspects of their character and truly begin to be understand the need to recognize Anthroposophia as an independent, invisible being…”

RUDOLF STEINER’S CALENDAR OF THE SOUL
translated (with added titles) by Roy Sadler
LAMMASTIDE II
Can I Imagine Spiritual Need?
v18
Can I make wide my soul
that she unite with seed
of Cosmic Word conceived?
I feel my foresight asking me
to find the strangth my soul will need
to form her spirit garment worthily.

v18 and its mirror, v35, are the only question verses.

ADVENT II
Can I Be Present?
v35
Can I absorb true being
that it may find itself anew
within my soul’s creative urge?
I feel a power trusting me
to make myself with modesty
a member of the Cosmic Self.

Caves under the sea

Insight, Lecture, Rudolf Steiner Quote
My Life as a Lens / unsplash.com

Greetings friends – I am just bobbing my head up from a deep dive – my 1st foray as a member of the General Council of the Anthroposophical Society in America. Thruout the 4 day retreat we worked with a lecture series by Rudolf Steiner called simply – ‘Anthroposophy, An Introduction’, GA 234, given a year before he died, from January – February of 1924. These 9 lectures are a kind of recapitulation, a deepening of concepts he gave 21 years earlier in his seminal books ‘Theosophy’, & ‘How to Know Higher Worlds’.

Steiner asks us to face life’s riddles, as he takes us from ordinary knowing to the science of initiation. On this path of the soul to the spiritual we peel away yet another layer in the exploration of the various sheaths of the human being. Are we willing to transcend the chains of necessity binding us to the destructive forces inherent in the laws of nature? We can ask things like: “How does a moral impulse come to move bone by muscle?”

Ram Daleti

When we seek the moral element within us, we meet ourselves in a fresh way – thru imaginative thinking – the human being as small ocean, our fluid etheric self – taking us back to the womb –  & at birth, “time becomes space“, for the etheric body is a “time-organism”, just as the physical body is a “space-organism”.  

To Balance the rounding down centripetal forces we live into inspired feeling. The inner music of our breath streaming in as living beings, & out again to be read by our higher self, allows us to look directly into the spiritual world, where “space must become time for us“.

Steiner describes the human being as a “comet stretching its tail far back into the past”. And so it is that inspiration can reveal our past incarnations when we empty our consciousness – “suggest away” all the pictures we have built up, leaving that strengthened space  open. Music (or a scent) can unlock experiences, perhaps memories from another life. “Our moral impulses act indirectly, through the ego of our last incarnation.”

Artists' responses to the Holocaust | Imperial War Museums
Ilene Wentworth Merkel

Intuition activating the will of the true “I”, “is attained by making the power of love a cognitive force” – to be able to go out of ourselves, selflessly, with warmth of soul, & live into another human being…

we are connected. - jaymin - Paintings & Prints, People & Figures, Portraits, Male - ArtPal
Jeffery Centoff

I hope that little nugget of a synopsis wets your appetite to read this series for yourself. It is truly food for the soul.

Frederic Leighton

On the 2nd day of the retreat, (11 June 2021) we took a break in the afternoon. I went to do my midday Circle meditation & fell asleep. Tomorrow I will share what Steiner had to say in the above lectures about the sleeping human being, but for now here is the dream I had during my afternoon nod:

The Illustrated Jules Verne: Voyage au centre de la Terre | Literature art, Earth illustration, Jules verne

I am in a kind-of Jules Vern landscape – caves under the sea. I am part of a community that lives there. We are all dressed like the time of the French Revolution: with big powered-wigs & fancy clothes; everyone is wearing overstated makeup. A woman – one of the leaders has a presentment that an important ‘book’ was to appear. We travel into another chamber of the cave which is vast & airy, & there is a large group pf people that have Ethiopian / Egyptian features, very tall and thin with coal black skin. Their faces are all painted in bright yellow chalk, which gives them a striking countenance. They are bare chested, with leather skirts & black bands around their left arms. The woman wear large top hats & their breasts are painted bright yellow like their faces. They are all smoking pipes that emit pure clean oxygen which enlivens the chamber. They stare out as if in a deep meditative state. The air vibrates & moves like music. I stand there certain that they have ‘the book’. I am filled with a deep feeling of gratitude & anticipation.

It’s been a long weekend & I am still digesting. I feel like I have taken a turn somehow…

As my friend Mary Louise always says: Onward!

~hag

Angela Foster

Summer Practice & Research Group – 6 Essential Exercises & Eightfold Path

Beginning Saturday June 12 and ending July 24.

9:00 – 9:15 am PT / 10 am MT / 11 am CT / noon ET / 5 pm UTC / 6 pm CET

Daily 15-minute Zoom for 42 days (6 weeks)

You are invited to join with a group of friends as we explore Rudolf Steiner’s 6 Essential Exercises alongside the Eightfold / Daily Exercise Path.

This is a practice group AND a research group. We are experimenting with weaving our attention with weekly rhythm of the 6BE and the daily rhythm of Eightfold Path/ Daily Exercises. You are encouraged to bring a journal to make notes and keep track of your progress.

Zoom Link 

Free

William Wolff

‘Preparing the Way’ an experiential St. John’s-Tide Festival

23 June 2021, Doors open at 5:30 pm with a Potluck -Program from  7-8:30 pm

In-person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch 4248 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago, 60618

The program is evolving – There is a possibility that world-renowned eurythmist Jan Ranck from the Jerusalem Academy of Eurythmy will lead us in group eurythmy (TBA)

Other activities may include: 

Art – Mary Spalding

Spacial Dynamics – Deborah Rogers

Singing – Elizabeth Kelly

Group discussion – Hazel Archer

If Jan Ranck is leading – $20 pre-pay online or $30 at the door (no one turned away for lack of funds)

For more info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hazel Archer

Sea Cooke

St. John the Baptist and Uriel the Archangel of Summer –

An Experiential Festival with Geoff Norris, Elizabeth Carlson, Lisa Dalton, Hazel Archer

Sunday 27 June 2021 on Zoom: Noon – 1:30 pm PT / 1 – 2:30 pm MT / 2 pm – 3:30 pm CT / 3 – 4:30 pm ET / 8 – 9:30 pm London Time / 9 – 10:30 pm CET

Metanoia –  Can you hear the voice of conscience? – Make straight the path, for at the fullness of Summer, the light is so bright that it leaves no room for the shadow, a time to remember what St. John said “Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

Musicial Performance by Lucien Dante Lazar

Speech – Geoffrey Norris

Eurythmy- Elizabeth Carlson

Living into St. John’s-Tide – Lisa Dalton

Leading Thoughts – Hazel Archer

Hazel Archer is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: St. John’s
Time: Jun 27, 2021 02:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting
https://zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=TkMwcGVVdk5GTVJmVzVJS2s5YVFtQT09

Meeting ID: 705 293 1041
Passcode: Uriel

Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/a961qZZhF

For more info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hazel Archer Hazel@reverseritual.com

Not 1 without the other

Lecture, Poetry, Rudolf Steiner Quote
Light in a Dark place - Ahayah Purpose - Paintings & Prints, Abstract, Other Abstract - ArtPal
Lete Ahaya

POD (Poem Of the Day)

~The truth
Of what we call our knowing
Is both light & dark…
Humans are always dying & waking…
The rhythm between, we call life…
Some miracle is about
To happen…
~hag

***

Here is today’s ‘I Think Speech‘ Podcast an important quote from Rudolf Steiner, Manifestations of Karma, LECTURE 8

***

Ablutions: A priest purifies the hands of another one, on an altar. A daily ritual. Ancient Egyptian tomb. | Antike ägyptische kunst, Ägyptische kunst, Alte kunst

“…the Egyptian-Chaldean period is repeated in our own…We may go back to the epoch of the Egyptian evolution, and there we find certain ritualistic ordinances and commands which appeared as given by the gods. And this they actually were. These ordinances related to certain ablutions which the Egyptians had to perform. This was a command of the gods, that found expression in a certain cult of cleanliness…

COVID-19 Return to Work Hygiene: Wash Your Hands

We now again, in our own period, encounter hygienic measures such as are given to humanity but in our time, for materialistic reasons. Here we see a repetition of what was lost at a corresponding period in Egypt. The fulfilment of what happened earlier is represented in the general karma in a most remarkable manner. In ancient Egypt the laws of cleanliness were laws of Divine revelation. The Egyptian believed that he was fulfilling his duty to humanity by caring for his particular cleanliness at every opportunity. This preoccupation for cleanliness comes to the fore again today, but under the influence of a mentality which is entirely materialistic. Modern man does not think that he is serving the gods when he is obeying such rules, but that he is serving himself. It is nevertheless a reappearance of what went before.

Mumbai Artist Dhruvi Acharya is creating coronavirus-themed watercolour paintings
Dhruvi Acharya

Thus all things are in a certain way cyclically fulfilled. If at a certain period people were not able to conceive certain measures against epidemics, these were times at which men could not do so because, according to the general wise world plan, the epidemics had to take effect in order to give human souls an opportunity of balancing what had been effected through the ahrimanic influence and certain earlier luciferic influences. If other conditions are now being brought about, these too are subject to certain great karmic laws. So we see that these matters cannot be regarded superficially.

How does this agree with our statement that if someone seeks an opportunity of being infected in an epidemic, this is the result of the necessary reaction against an earlier karmic cause. Have we the right now to take hygienic or other measures?

This is a profound question, and we must begin by collecting the necessary material for replying to it. We must understand that where the luciferic and ahrimanic principles are co-operating, whether concurrently or over longer periods, or where they are working against each other, there are manifested certain complications in human life. These complications appear under forms so diverse that we never see two identical cases. If we study human life, however, we shall find our way in the following manner: if in a particular case we try to discover the combined activity of Lucifer and Ahriman, we shall always find a thread by which this connection will become clear. We must discriminate clearly between internal and external man. We must examine the continuity in which karma is accomplished, and we must at the same time understand that we have still the possibility of influencing our inner being by means of certain karmic influences, so that in future a new karmic compensation may be prepared by the inner being.

Dhruvi Acharya, Painting in the Time of Corona, 26 April 2020, lockdown day 33, 2020 | Chemould Prescott Road
Dhruvi Acharya

It may well happen that we, following for a time a downward grade, beget evil. We at first descend in order to develop the contrary impetus that will cause us to re-ascend. Let us suppose that a being, by yielding to certain influences, tends towards uncharitableness. This uncharitableness will in a later life appear as karmic result, and will develop inner forces in his organism.

We can then act in two ways — consciously, or else unconsciously. In our epoch we have not progressed so far as to do it consciously. With such a person we can take precautions by which these characteristics in his organism, derived from uncharitableness, will be driven out and we may act in such a way that the effect that is expressed in the external organism as a lack of charity will be counteracted. By these means, however, the soul will not be cleansed of all uncharitableness, but only the external organ of uncharitableness will have been expelled. For if we do nothing further, we shall have accomplished only half of our task, perhaps even nothing at all, or we may even do harm. We may perhaps have helped this person physically, externally, but we shall not have given succour to his soul. Now that the physical expression of uncharitableness has been removed he will not be able to give expression to this uncharitableness, but he will have to retain it within his inner organism until a future incarnation.

Dhruvi Acharya paints the fear of pandemic
Dhruvi Acharya

Let us suppose that a great number of people, because of uncharitableness, had been impelled to absorb certain infectious germs, so that they succumbed to an epidemic. Let us further suppose we were in a position to protect them from this epidemic. We should in such a case preserve the physical body from the effects of uncharitableness, but by doing this we have not removed the inner tendency towards uncharitableness.

Nature Morte – Dhruvi Acharya
Dhruvi Acharya

If we want to bring a true healing, we must also undertake the duty of influencing the soul in such a way as to remove from it the tendency towards a lack of charity, or the disease will go deeper into the soul.

The organic expression of uncharitableness is killed in the external bodily sense for instance by vaccination against smallpox, but the soul continues to be sick. In one period of civilisation, when there prevailed a general tendency to develop a higher degree of egotism, and uncharitableness, an epidemic made its appearance. Such is the fact investigated by Spiritual Science. In anthroposophy it is our bounded duty to give expression to the truth.

A Postcard from Delhi - Contemporary Art Society
Dhruvi Acharya

Now it will be clear why in our time the desire for the protection of vaccination appeared. We also understand why, among the best minds of our time, there also exists a kind of aversion to vaccination. This aversion corresponds to something within, and is the external expression of an inner reality, that seeks to karmicly rid itself of the cause of the disease.

So if on the one hand we destroy the physical expression of a previous fault, we should, on the other hand, undertake the duty of transforming the materialistic character of such a person by means of a corresponding spiritual education. This would constitute the indispensable counterpart without which we are performing only half our task. We are merely accomplishing something to which the person in question will himself have to produce a counterpart in a later incarnation. If we destroy the susceptibility to smallpox, for instance, we are concentrating only on the external side of karmic activity.

Now Showing > Dhruvi Acharya | INDIAN BY DESIGN
Dhruvi Acharya

If on the one side we go in for hygiene, it is necessary that on the other we should feel it our duty to contribute to the person whose organism has been so transformed, something also for the good of his soul. Vaccination will not be harmful if, subsequent to vaccination, the person receives a spiritual education. But if we concentrate upon one side only and lay no emphasis upon the other, we weigh down the balance unevenly. We see how essential it is that we should not undertake one task without the other.

Here we approach an important law of human evolution which acts so that the external and the internal must always be counter-balanced, and that it is not permissible to act with regard to the one only, leaving the other out of consideration. We here get a glimpse of an important relationship, and yet we have not even arrived at the significance of the question: ‘What is the relationship between hygiene and karma?’ As we shall see, the answer to this question will lead us still further into the depths of karma, and we shall further see that there exist karmic relationships between man’s birth and death. In addition, other personalities influence a human life, and man’s free will and karma must be in harmony. ~ Rudolf Steiner, Manifestations of Karma, LECTURE 8

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14 January 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: In bright twilight, look low in the southwest for the thin crescent Moon aiming her curve lower right toward Mercury & disappearing Jupiter.

Above Orion shines orange Aldebaran with the large, loose Hyades cluster in its background. The Pleiades higher above.

Universal “I AM”

Festival, History, Lecture, Remembering, Rudolf Steiner Quote, Speaking with the Stars

The Tuesday (Mars day) of Pentecost – The festival of the Word, a new Language of the Sophia-Logos, holding the ideal of Free Speech!  Our day star Sun is speaking thru the  stars of the Bull at this time, that region of the Zodiac connected to the human Larynx, giving us the capacity for self-expression.

The current World events must be given voice. Pentecost is the festival of NOW, highlighting the challenging relationships of self & community. –  Offering us an opportunity to transcend race. How do we work as individuals to transform our ingrained sympathies & antipathies? How do we purify our astral nature in order to make ourselves into a vessel worthy to receive the Holy Spirit, giving us the possibility of manifesting the ‘Spirit Self’, the True Self which will provide the capacity to create new social forms..?

Thinking of Pentecost as being 50 days after Easter, & in looking at the # 5, we see the 4 bodies of the human being: physical, etheric, astral & “I” – given a 5th dimension – a new spiritual aspect is added: The Spirit-Self, the Higher Ego.

Aggripa

The pentagram is the symbol of the true human being, (the inverted pentagram is a symbol of black magic – that which seeks to destroy this higher human being).   The numbers 4 & 5 raised to the 10th power, indicate a process taking place at a higher spiritual level, which is how the events described in 40 days = Ascension & 50 days = Pentecost,  are meant to be understood, both as historical events of Christ’s union with the earth, but also as initiatory events taking place on a higher plane for humanity.

Rudolf Steiner defines the 10 days between Ascension & Pentecost as a time of deep sadness, grief & loss for the apostles. He describes it as ‘a sorrow such as cannot be compared with any other sorrow on earth’ –A kind of death experience on a spiritual level. And just like in the old mystery traditions, after the time of catharsis & preparation, there is a mystical death; so here too there is a kind of loss & experience of death. The #10 is the number of completion.

It Hides Behind Her Tips Painting by Pablo Damas
Bea Trumbel

Steiner points out: ‘All real knowledge, all knowledge that can truly be called great is born from pain, from inner travail…And out of this pain, out of this infinite sorrow, there sprang what we call the Mystery of Pentecost…Having lost sight of the Christ in external clairvoyant vision (the 40 days with the Resurrected Christ), the disciples found it again in their inmost being…found it through sorrow, through pain.  (May 17, 1923, Christiana)

Donna Vector

Here we have a great reversal. In ancient times the human being experienced the True Self, the Higher I AM, in the cosmos outside of them, in the Sun sphere, thru initiation, by leaving the body. 

Ninetta Sombart

Even in with Lazarus, the first Christian initiation performed on Earth, in public, by the Christ, Lazarus was “called forth” by Christ as the hierophant from without.

Pentecost inaugurates a new age, when human beings thru a personal path of self-guided catharsis comes to an awakening of the Higher I AM in “their inmost being” as a force of transformative power, which is the force of love.

Opinion | The Uncommon Power of Grace - The New York Times

The Greek word for grace is, “charis”, which means the free love from God.  In ancient Greek, there are several words for love:  eros – romantic love; philia – brotherly/family love; agape – divine love, or love of the human for the divine. 

Grace and the human person (IV)
Johannes Demmer

One other word for love is charis.  Charis is higher than agape, because it is the love of the Divine for the human being. This is the highest form of love.

The Gospel of St. John - Dr. Rudolf Steiner Bookstore and ...

In the 12th of Steiner’s lectures on the ‘Gospel of John’, which he describes as the most spiritual perspective given by the writers of the gospels, he speaks of how John never uses the name Mary, but always says: “the mother of Jesus”.  He equates this with the ‘Virgin Sophia’ – the purified astral body.  It is this Virgin Sophia = the Mother of Jesus, who is “in their midst” at Pentecost. 

The story goes on to say that they were all together in one place, using the word which is often translated as house, but in Greek it means “a shared, common place”, a community place.   Into this community place, with the Virgin Sophia in their midst, came the Holy Spirit, the Universal Ego, the true I AM, which can then speak out of this purified astral body. 

This Holy Spirit came with a rushing of wind & flames that individualized onto each of the disciples, & “stayed upon each of them”(this is the same term used at the Baptism of Jesus) They then began to speak a new language “as the

Holy Spirit gave them utterance.”  This was a speaking, which transcended earthly languages, for everyone understood & were amazed.

In this same lecture from the Gospel of John cycle, Steiner addresses this question: ‘a person thus illuminated, who has received the Holy Spirit into himself, speaks in a different manner.  How does he speak? …he is not expressing ‘his’ own opinion. His views do not come into consideration.  His personal (earthly) ego has been eclipsed which means that…it has become impersonal and it is the Cosmic Universal Ego’.

He continues this Pentecostal theme in a lecture on Whitsunday, 1910: ‘This Holy Spirit enables us to become free human souls.  As the Spirit of Freedom, it streamed out through the first disciples…in the first Pentecostal festival….We can become free only when we find ourselves again in spirit and out of the spirit become master over the spirit within ourselves. Our true spirit is the universal human spirit, which we recognize as the Pentecostal power of the Holy Spirit.. which we must bring to birth in ourselves and allow to become manifest…This will bring to life in our souls something which overleaps all boundaries separating the different parts of humanity’.

Leszek Forczek

This brings us back to the great call of our current time of Pentecost – which is the great social question of our time: the individual in relation to the whole, the community. 

Today we face immense questions about the future of humanity, with division, polarization, lack of understanding & failed communication, creating the social problems of our time. 

Only by a social & personal catharsis which can allow for the true spirit of freedom, the true I AM, to eclipse our small personal egotism & the lower impulses of our nature, can a new community & new language of universal sister/brotherhood be created. 

Bloom: One Hundred Years: In Recognition of Rudolf Steiner's ...

Only out of the spiritual recognition of the universal Human Being, will the ideas & applications of a new approach to fraternity in economics; equality in human rights; & freedom in the cultural/spiritual life, be accomplished. 

May we strive to serve this goal out of the spirit of The Sophia.

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Cassiopeia at its lowest

2 June 2020 – “Speaking with the Stars”: At inferior conjunction, Venus moves between Earth & Sun. This facilitates Venus in becoming the morning star, after her hidden journey into the Solar Logos.

Venus at inferior conjunction, June 3, 2020
2020, June 3: Venus passes between Earth and Sun – inferior conjunction – and begins to move into the morning sky when it rises before sunrise.

When we see the Sun in the south, our clocks read noon. The opposite direction is midnight. We do not see the sun in the sky at midnight, & Venus too will be hidden.

The line then divides the morning sky from the evening sky. Venus is moving toward the morning as she revolves around the Sun faster than Earth.

Venus Inferior Conjunction | Gray Crawford

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day 

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Venus Cycles | Geometry, Sacred geometry, Astronomy

“The Master said, “A true teacher is one who, keeping the past alive, is also able to understand the present.” (Analects 2.11)” ~Confucius

455 – Sack of Rome

1098 – First Crusade: The first Siege of Antioch ends as Crusader forces take the city; the second siege began five days later.

Pin on SALEM WITCH TRIALS

1692 – Bridget Bishop is the first person to go to trial in the Salem witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts; she was found guilty and later hanged

1882 – Deathday of Giuseppe Garibaldi, Italian general & politician. Spoken of as a high initiate in the Hibernian Mysteries in ‘Karmic Relationships’ Vol 1, lec. 11 by Rudolf Steiner (June 2nd is also Festa della Repubblica -The Italian National Republic Day)

Rudolf Steiner's Biography – Giorgio Tarditi Spagnoli

1922 – Start of the West-East Congress in Vienna, opened by Ludwig Polzer-Hoditz. At this conference Rudolf Steiner gave his last lecture on Threefolding (1917 – 1922)

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The Holy Spirit Within Painting by Sister Rebecca Shinas
Kerby Dalton

POD (Poem Of the Day)

~i am a form in the flame
seen only if one gazes long into the fire…
clouds of smoke tear like a shroud & i see the shine of other hidden ones,
faces aglow with heat
flashing like lightning, speaking with thunder…
rising in the smoke
the scent of my prayer
an incense of hope & wonder…
~hag

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MANIFESTATIONS OF KARMA: June 3rd, 2020 Zoom Meeting with the Central Regional Council 7:15 pm – 8:30 pm CDT
“He who observes human life carefully — not simply in a superficial way — may find remarkable connections in it. Unfortunately, the phenomena of human life are at present observed for only short periods of time, hardly even for a few years; people are not accustomed to connect what has happened after a long period of time, with what may have happened previously as the cause. There are very few at the present day who study the beginning and the end of a man’s life in their relationship to each other; nevertheless this relationship is extraordinarily instructive.” ~Rudolf Steiner, Manifestations of Karma

Chapter 1, “The Nature and Significance of Karma in the Personal and Individual, and in Humanity, the Earth and the Universe, Hamburg, 16 May, 1910 … focus of the June 3 meeting.

https://wn.rsarchive.org/…/GA120/E…/RSP1984/19100516p01.htmlAudio Conference Details: Join Zoom Meetinghttps://us02web.zoom.us/j/81116556762

Meeting ID: 811 1655 6762
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Find your local number: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kclU2SSTFIf you have questions, please contact Alberto Loya aloyavaca@peoplepc.com Agenda for our Study Call 

7:15 Welcome and Introductions
7:18 Verse
7:25 Study led by five volunteers
Note: CRC team will ID volunteers
Marianne – first section
Travis – second section
Lisa – third section
Alberto – fourth section
Hazel – fifth section
8:05 Conversation
8:28 Close with verse

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Friday 19 June 2020 – Front Range Anthroposophical Café presents:

The New Mysteries of St. Johns-Tide with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

To pass the test of Summer we will explore many questions:

  • How do we stand wakefully within the sublime mysteries of the Summer-Tide, to consciously embody ‘the spiritual wisdom of the gods’?
  • Who is the mysterious Archangel of Summer?
  • Who is John the Baptist? What do his sayings “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” And “He must increase, but I must decrease.” really mean?
  • What is the secret to healing the ‘soul-fever’ so prevalent in society today?
  • What is the mystery of the Dragon-fly, & other elemental beings?
  • How can we understand the ‘Cycle of the Year as Breathing Process of the Earth’?

Together we will work to strengthen our true “I”, enlivening our will forces.

We look forward to seeing you on Friday 19 June 2020 shortly before 7 PM (Mountain time.) Here is the link to our Anthroposophical Café and all you need to do to join us is click on it: https://zoom.us/j/294724669.

Warmly, Karen vann Vuuren, Tom Altgelt, Jamie York, and our growing circle of Café Friends – It’s better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.

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