3 January 2017 – Astro-Weather: The first major meteor shower of 2017, (& every of New Year) the Quadrantid meteor shower, will be at its best in the hours between midnight & dawn January 3 or 4. The radiant point for the Quadrantids is the northern tip of Bootes, near the Big Dipper asterism in our sky, not far from Arcturus, the brightest star in Bootes. This region climbs high in the northeast as dawn approaches. And, with the waxing crescent Moon setting before 10 pm CST, observers with clear weather will have ideal conditions. Under a dark sky, viewers can expect to see up to 120 meteors per hour — an average of two per minute.
***
Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day
TODAY – According to the original Calendar of the Soul:
Enoch – called ‘Enoch the scribe of judgment’. “In the seventh generation from Adam,” he was considered the author of the Book of Enoch, which recounts how he was taken up to Heaven & was appointed guardian of all the celestial treasures – chief of the archangels, & the immediate attendant of God’s throne. He was subsequently taught all secret mysteries &, with all the angels at his back, fulfills of his own accord whatever comes out of the mouth of God. Much esoteric literature identifies Enoch as Metatron, the angel which communicates God’s word. In consequence, Enoch was seen, by this literature, & the kabbala of Jewish mysticism, as having been the one which communicated God’s revelation to Moses, in particular. In addition to an appearance in the Book of Genesis, Enoch is the subject of many Jewish & Christian writings. Enoch was the son of Jared (Genesis 5:19–21), the father of Methuselah, & the great-grandfather of Noah. The Bible says that Enoch lived 365 years before he was taken up by God. The text reads that Enoch “walked with God: and he was no more; for God took him” (Gen 5:21–24)
The prophet Daniel – Hebrew: “God is my Judge“- was a hero who interprets dreams & receives apocalyptic visions. The Book of Daniel begins with an introduction telling how Daniel & his companions came to be in Babylon. Then a set of tales set in the Babylonian & Persian courts, followed by a set of visions in which Daniel sees the remote future of the world & of Israel.
Daniel & 3 friends were among the young Jewish nobility carried off to Babylon following the city’s capture by Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon. The four are chosen for their intellect & beauty to be trained in the Babylonian court. They are given new names. Daniel is given the Babylonian name Belteshazzar, while his companions are given the Babylonian names Shadrach, Meshach, & Abednego. Which we read about in the famous story of the fiery furnace
Daniel & his friends refuse the food & wine provided by the king of Babylon to avoid breaking the Jewish laws. They receive wisdom from God & surpass “all the magicians & enchanters of the kingdom.”
Nebuchadnezzar dreams of a giant statue made of four metals with feet of mingled iron & clay, smashed by a stone from heaven. Only Daniel is able to interpret it: the dream signifies 4 kingdoms, of which Babylon is the 1st, but God will destroy them & replace them with his own kingdom.
Nebuchadnezzar dreams of a great tree that shelters the entire world & of a heavenly figure who decrees that the tree will be destroyed; again, only Daniel can interpret the dream, which concerns the sovereignty of God over the kings of the earth.
When Nebuchadnezzar’s son King Belshazzar uses the vessels from the Jewish temple for his feast, a hand appears & writes a mysterious message on the wall, which only Daniel can interpret; it tells the king that his kingdom will be given to the Medes & Persians, because Belshazzar, unlike Nebuchadnezzar, has not acknowledged the sovereignty of the God of Daniel.
The Medes & Persians overthrow Nebuchadnezzar & the new king, Darius the Mede, appoints Daniel to high authority. Jealous rivals attempt to destroy Daniel with an accusation that he worships God instead of the king, & Daniel is thrown into a den of lions, but an angel saves him, his accusers are destroyed, & Daniel is restored to his position.
In the third year of Darius, Daniel has a series of visions. In the first, four beasts come out of the sea, the last with ten horns, & an eleventh horn grows & achieves dominion over the Earth & the “Ancient of Days” – God gives dominion to “one like a son of man”. An angel interprets the vision.
In the second, a ram with two horns is attacked by a goat with one horn; the one horn breaks & is replaced by four. A little horn arises & attacks the people of God & the temple, & Daniel is informed how long the little horn’s dominion will endure.
In the third, Daniel is troubled to read in Holy Scripture (the book is not named but appears to be Jeremiah) that Jerusalem would be desolate for 70 years. Daniel repents on behalf of the Jews & requests that Jerusalem & its people be restored. An angel refers to a period of 70 sevens, or weeks, of years.
In the final vision, Daniel sees a period of history culminating in a struggle between the “king of the north” & the “king of the south” in which God’s people suffer terribly; an angel explains that in the end the righteous will be vindicated & God’s kingdom will be established on Earth.
Caspar – the youngest of the Magi, was King of Tarsus, a historic city in south-central Turkey. His gift was myrrh, which was used in making medicines. This symbolized Christ as the healer & great physician.
236 – The Deathday of Pope Anterus, Bishop of Rome. Anterus was the son of Romulus, born in Calabria. He is thought to have been of Greek origin, & his name may indicate that he was a freed slave. Scholars believe he was martyred because he ordered greater strictness in searching into the acts of the martyrs.
***
10th Holy Night: Constellation of Gemini, Twins (ruling the lungs, arms, & shoulders) The Sphere of the Seraphim, Spirits of Love –
The ceaseless yearning of the Seraphim for the sphere of the Holy Spirit above them brings the impetus of Universal Love which begets the will to sacrifice. An earthly reflection of this macrocosmic impulse of love can be seen in the ancient Greek myth of the Twin Brothers Castor & Pollux – where the immortal twin is willing to sacrifice himself for his brother.
In the Christian epoch, after the Christ-Impluse enters into earthly evolution, love becomes universal, going beyond the love founded on blood-ties. ‘My command is this: Love one another as I have loved you. There is no greater love than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command.’ (John 15: 12-14) The Spiritual Love that Christ arouses is the fulfilment of the fundamental principle of all true Christian Mysteries – ‘Not I but Christ in me’.
We see this Universal Love in the being of the Nathan Soul, the Jesus of the Luke Gospel, who sacrificed himself 4 times in the pre-earthly deeds, to be the vessel of Christ. We see it in the Mary of the Luke Gospel, who united with Mary of the Matthew Gospel, allowing the Divine Sophia to enter the earthly realm.
We see it in the willing of Zarathustra, who incarnated as the Jesus of the Matthew Gospel, & sacrificed himself to allow the Christ to descend at the Baptism. In ancient Persia, during the age of Gemini, Zarathustra was a great Magi, able to foretell the coming of Christ, who he saw as Ahura Mazdao. This vision gave him the impulse to sacrifice himself in his coming lives in order to prepare for it. Since ‘The turning point of time’, the individuality of Zarathustra has incarnated again & again as ‘Master Jesus’ – & is one of the circle of 12 Bodhisattvas who inspire humanity towards developing this selfless Universal Love.
In the 6 cultural epoch we will see a recapitulation of the age of Gemini on a higher level. It will be a time that stands under the signature of the Wedding at Cana, where those who unite in the Spirit of Christ will feel good-will towards one another even though they are not blood-relations. Finally on ‘Vulcan’, at the end of earth evolution, this sacrificial love will have created a new Cosmos, a universe of love created by Human Beings as the 10th hierarchy of Freedom & Love.
Christ Himself shows us the way, He put this Love into practice, sacrificing his Heavenliness in order to descend from the Trinity beyond the Zodiac, into earthly evolution, to unite Himself for all times with humanity, becoming the ultimate example by fulfilling the deed on Golgotha. Christ Himself-a God-lay down his life, to die an earthly death in Jesus.
John, the disciple that Jesus loved most, a direct witness to all the events that he describes in his Gospel, knows this love thru his initiation as Lazarus. ‘By this we know love, that He laid down His life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers & sisters. If anyone has material possessions and sees a friend in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Dear children in Christ, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth’. (1 John 3:16 – 18)
And so we see how all impulses concerning community, & the social life, all striving towards joining together on the basis of mutual love & genuine interest in one another, arise from the region of Gemini. Also Rudolf Steiner tells us: ‘From fixed star to fixed star, a reciprocal conversation holds sway. Through this conversation the cosmos comes into being. Whatever the planetary systems speak about with one another across the widths of space in order to become a cosmos is regulated by those Spirits that new call the Seraphim’.
What would it look like to bring this Cosmic Universal Love, consciously into our world today? To resolve for this New Year, & very year, to open our thinking-hearts, with the intension of enacting an unconditional Love which is capable of uniting like-minded people, kindred-souls, who are willing to walk the talk, & join together in communion with the Spirits of Love, who yearn for us to join the cosmic conversation …?!?
We are all Twin-Souls United in Christ
Virtue: Perseverance becomes faithfulness
As we persist in developing the ability to be depended upon, faithfulness ripens. We must persevere even when we can’t see any outward progress. We insist on the progress toward self-development, in service of our true destiny. We owe this to our “I”, to the world, & to those around us. It is honoring The Divine Will, not our own personal will.
Gemini Meditation: “I recognize my other self and in the waning of that self, I grow and glow.“