“When you sit in the Sukkah, ‘the shade of faithfulness,’ the Shechinah spreads Her wings over you…”
The Shechinah is the Divine Feminine Presence, made manifest especially when the harvest season is upon us.
The Jewish New Year has begun, Sweet with the seal of At-One-ment…& now, the ancient celebration of Sukkot comes, to bring community together for a unique opportunity to experience an amazing blend of Honoring the Ancestors, Giving Thanks, & opening to receive prosperity’s blessings…
Please join us in spirit as we: Share food, Tell stories, Create Autumn Art, Invite in the Matriarchs of the Torah, & many other loving ancestors, & perform the ancient ritual of waving the Lulav, for blessings of abundance…
The Festival of Sukkot is quite a drastic transition, from one of the most solemn holidays of the year- Yom Kipper – to one of the most joyous. This festival is sometimes referred to as the ‘Season of our Rejoicing’. Sukkot begins tonight & lasts for seven days.
The word “Sukkot” means “booths,” & refers to the temporary dwellings built to celebrate this holiday frequently translated as “The Feast of Tabernacles,” & Like Passover & Shavu’ot, Sukkot has a dual significance: Historical & Agricultural.
The holiday commemorates the forty-year period during which the children of Israel were wandering in the desert, living in temporary shelters. Sukkot is also a harvest festival, & is sometimes referred to as the ‘Festival of Ingathering’.
This is harvest time, so we decorate the sukkah with the bounty of autumn, squash & corn, pumpkin & gourds, all the vegetables that make you think of Halloween & Thanksgiving. Building & decorating a sukkah is a fun, family project, much like decorating the Christmas tree.
Another observance related to Sukkot involves what are known as The Four Species, etrog (a citrus fruit, representing the heart), a palm branch (in Hebrew, lulav, representing the spine of the upright human being), two willow branches (arava, representing our eyes) & three myrtle branches (hadas, representing our lips & tongue). We take these four plants & use them to “rejoice.” The six branches are bound together & referred to collectively as the lulav. The etrog is held separately. With these four species in hand, one recites a blessing & waves the species in all six directions (east, south, west, north, up & down, symbolizing the fact that the Divine is everywhere).
Ushpizot is an Aramaic word meaning guests. According to Jewish tradition, each night of Sukkot, a different set of guests is invited to rejoice with us. While the custom of inviting Ushpizin, seven biblical male leaders, has been widely celebrated, there are also medieval sources that suggest inviting the seven female prophetesses: Sarah (Genesis 16,21), Miriam (Exodus 2:1-9; 15:20-21), Deborah (Judges 4-5), Hannah (I Samuel 25), Huldah (II Kings 22:10-20), & Esther (Book of Esther).
So come join us in spirit, with thoughts of peace & healing, to be part of this experiential celebration…What great leaders, proud Matriarchs or darling Daddies would you like to invite into the sukkah…? Let this ancient tradition made new, empower you to meet the Supernal Mother, The Shechinah waiting to be redeemed…
Blessings & Peace
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3 October 2020 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Bella Luna reaches apogee — the farthest point from our planet in its orbit from Earth.
Finally starting to noticeably wane from Full, our satellite rises near Uranus tonight. You will find the pair between the bright stars Hamal in Aries & Menkar in Cetus.
Southwest of the duo is bright Mars in Pisces. Keep looking west, past Pisces, to find Neptune in eastern Aquarius.
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Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day
ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
508 BC – Deathday of Lucretia an ancient Roman woman whose fate played a vital role in the transition of Roman government from the Roman Kingdom to the Roman Republic. She committed suicide after being raped by an Etruscan king’s son was the immediate cause of the anti-monarchist rebellion that overthrew the monarchy. As a result of its sheer impact, the rape itself became a major theme in European art & literature
Deathay of Jarius. The record of the daughter of Jairus is a combination of miracles of Jesus in the Gospels (Mark 5:21–43, Matthew 9:18–26, Luke 8:40–56) The story immediately follows the exorcism at Gerasa. Jairus, a patron or ruler of a Galilee synagogue, had asked Jesus to heal his 12-year-old daughter. As they were traveling to Jairus’ house, a sick woman in the crowd touched Jesus’ cloak & was healed of her sickness. Jesus turned round to the woman & says: “Take heart, daughter,” your faith has healed you. Go in peace.” Moments later, a messenger arrived with the news that Jairus’ daughter had died, & he was advised not to trouble Jesus any further. However, Jesus responded: Be not afraid, only believe. (Mark 5:36) Jesus continued to the house, where he informed all those present that the girl was not dead but asleep. He then went upstairs & restored the little girl to life. In Mark’s account, the Aramaic phrase “Talitha Koum” (transliterated into Greek as ταλιθα κουμ meaning, “Little girl, I say to you, get up!”) is attributed to Jesus
Deathday of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, a Syrian Christian theologian & philosopher of the late 5th to early 6th century, the author of the set of works commonly referred to as the Corpus Areopagiticum or Corpus Dionysiacum, portraying himself as the Athenian convert of Paul of Tarsus mentioned in Acts 17:34 (Some of the people became followers of Paul and believed. Among them was Dionysius, a member of the Areopagus) This attribution to the earliest decades of Christianity resulted in the work being given great authority in subsequent theological writing in both East & West. His works are mystical & show strong Neoplatonic influence. For example he uses Plotinus’ well-known analogy of a sculptor cutting away that which does not enhance the desired image.
In a letter addressed to Polycarp, pseudo-Dionysius asks “What have you to say about the solar eclipse which occurred when the Savior was put on the Cross? At the time the two of us were in Heliopolis and we both witnessed the extraordinary phenomenon of the moon hiding the sun at the time that was out of season for their coming together…. We saw the moon begin to hide the sun from the east, travel across to the other side of the sun, and return on its path so that the hiding and the restoration of the light did not take place in the same direction but rather in diametrically opposite directions.…” This is illustrated in an astronomical fresco in the main gallery of the Escorial Library, near Madrid, Spain, which shows Dionysius the Areopagite observing an eclipse at the time of Christ’s crucifixion.
Luke, 23-45 (It was now about the sixth hour, and darkness came over all the land until the ninth hour. 45The sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was torn down the middle) We can notice a quadrant & an astrolabe in the hands of the amazed men!
287 AD – Deathday of Saint Candidus. The Golden Legend states that he was a commander of the Theban Legion, which was composed of Christians from Upper Egypt. He opposed Maximian, who had ordered them to harass the local Christians in his name, stating that “we are your soldiers, but we are also servants of the true God. We cannot renounce Him who is our Creator and Master, and also yours even though you reject Him.” Candidus, along with St. Maurice, the other staff officers & 6,600 soldiers, were martyred at the Swiss town of Saint Maurice-en-Valais
1226 – Deathday of Francis of Assisi, Italian friar & saint. Based on a study of the life of Francis of Assisi, Rudolf Steiner shows how the development of morality is based on the belief in the Divine at the bottom of every human soul, on the boundless love that springs from this belief, and on the hope for each human soul that it can find its way back to the Divine. Anthroposophical Ethics…St. Francis, Lecture III
1250 – Deathday of Gilbertus Anglicus. His major work, the Compendium Medicinae, written in Latin, running to seven books, is an attempt to provide a comprehensive encyclopedia of medical & surgical knowledge as it existed in his day. He quotes extensively from Roger of Palma, & acknowledges that his work is indebted to Greek physicians including Galen, Hippocrates & Theophilus Protospatharius, & Arab physicians such as Averroes & Avicenna.
1884 – Birthday of, Paul Foster Case, an American occultist, founder of Builders of the Adytum (B.O.T.A.), original member of Alpha et Omega, an organization that inherited the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.
Paul Foster Case played the organ in the Congregational Church, where his father was a deacon. In childhood, he started working to have lucid dreams. Rudyard Kipling, spurred his interest in their correspondence, confirming that such a phenomenon is possible, & can be developed.
Case became a member of the Order of Alpha et Omega, but he was distrustful of Enochian Magic. He explored certain practical ceremonial magic, with his sometime partner Moina Mathers.
Case was fascinated by the “New Thought” movement, he met William Walker Atkinson, & co-authored the modern literary mystification “The Kybalion”, as one of the anonymous “three wise men”.
Case studied various yoga’s & the karma of past lives, & was said to have worked with “the healer Dr. Fludd” who claimed that the Count Saint-Germain had sent him to be his teacher.
1942 – Spaceflight: The first successful launch of a V-2 /A4-rocket from Test Stand VII at Peenemünde, Germany. It is the first man-made object to reach space.
1952 – The United Kingdom successfully tests a nuclear weapon to become the world’s third nuclear power.
1962 – Project Mercury: Sigma 7 is launched from Cape Canaveral, with astronaut Wally Schirra aboard, for a six-orbit, nine-hour flight.
1963 – A violent coup in Honduras pre-empts the October 13 election, ends a period of reform, & begins two decades of military rule.
1981 – The hunger strike by Provisional Irish Republican Army & Irish National Liberation Army prisoners at the Maze Prison in Northern Ireland ends after 7months & 10 deaths.
1985 – The Space Shuttle Atlantis makes its maiden flight. (Mission STS-51-J)
1986 – TASCC, a superconducting cyclotron at the Chalk River Laboratories, is officially opened
1990 – German reunification: The German Democratic Republic ceases to exist & its territory becomes part of the Federal Republic of Germany. East German citizens became part of the European Community, which later became the European Union. Now celebrated as German Unity Day
1995 – O. J. Simpson is acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson & Ronald Goldman
2008 – The Emergency Economic Stabilization Act is signed by President George W. Bush – commonly referred to as a bailout of the U.S. financial system, is a law enacted in response to the subprime mortgage crisis authorizing the United States Secretary of the Treasury to spend up to $700 billion to purchase distressed assets, especially mortgage-backed securities, & supply cash directly to banks
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Ok so here’s something to chew on to clear the palate :
Being, Quantity, Quality, Relation, Space, Time, Position, Possession, Action, Suffering. ~Aristotle’s Katēgoriais or Praedicamenta.
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All Souls Festival:
The Connection Between Epidemics, the Souls of the Dead, & the Spiritual World – Leading thoughts by Hazel Archer-Ginsberg.
With Group Eurythmy, Singing, Social Sculpture while reading the names of the dead & Break out Sessions.
In-person at Elderberries Biodynamic Outpost & 3 fold Cultural Hub, in conjunction with the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago, 4249-51 N. Lincoln Ave.
& On-line (details coming soon)
2 pm – 4 pm CDT Sunday 8 November 2020
