Monthly Archives: December 2021

“…Tremulous light…”

Hung with the frosty veils of Winter, the Sun has 2 more days to wane, before the return of the light. In Sidereal Astrology we know that soon the scorpion will hand the reigns over to the centaur of Sagittarius– a catalyst for the transformation into the longest night of the Winter Solstice.

Diana Petrulyte Rodriguez Urbizt

In this time of the dark before the dawn, the image of the centaur stands before us like the forces of gravity seeking to pull the human being down. It speaks to the danger inherent in this final chapter of Advent, reflecting Herod’s fearful animal instinct to preserve himself by the killing the innocents. This evil act precedes the birth of the light.

Gilles de Rais

Yet ancient myths tell of the hidden wisdom of the centaur. They speak of the struggle of the hero to overcome the bondage of the animalistic drive. It is the eternal drama that plays out in the depths of the human soul.  

Franz Simm

Inspired by this struggle Goethe has his character Faust carried thru the night on the back of Chiron the centaur, past the turbulent waters of the Peneios, to seek out the secluded sanctuary of wise Manto, who is to show Faust the way to Helena, the lost archetypal image of the Divine Feminine. Faust praises Chiron as a doctor & tutor.

Yin Stacho

The riddle of this strange contradiction of the centaur – the wildness & wisdom living so close together, is rooted in the tragicomedy of human incarnation.

On the way to becoming human we had to be bound to the forces of our animal nature which have attached us for so long to the lower materiality –

Until we can find our way to liberation. The truth hidden behind the consumerism of Christmas is the mystery of the incarnation of Christ – holding the key to this healing of the human being.  

O, thou slumber’s turning,  O, thou sorrow’s ending!” ~Christian Morgenstern

Peace dear friends on this 4th week of Advent

~hag

19 December 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Venus (occult Mercury) & Jupiter continue to shine brightly during twilight in the southwest. As twilight fades, watch for dimmer Saturn emerging between them. Jupiter & Saturn are far past opposition yet they are still in conversation.

Venus Retrograde In Capricorn - December 19, 2021

Venus retrograde today at 26° Capricorn and ends on 29 January 2022 at 11° Capricorn. 

Poe’s narrator peering at a pre-dawn crescent Venus, “distinct with its duplicate horn,” as Psyche, his winged soul, begs him away by Dante Gabriel Rossetti

Edgar Allan Poe – an amateur astronomer since boyhood, used the sighting of Venus as the central event in his poem “Ulalume” (1847) near the end of his life. Before dawn, a bereaved lover roams a misty woodland accompanied by “Psyche, my soul.” Ahead of them low in the east, they witness the new-risen Venus, star of romantic love in Roman mythology, coming “up through the lair of the Lion.” Poe refers to the planet as Astarte — the wilder, more wanton Greek version of the Romans’ Venus goddess:

And now, as the night was senescent,
And star-dials pointed to morn —
As the star-dials hinted of morn —

At the end of our path a liquescent
And nebulous lustre was born,
Out of which a miraculous crescent
Arose with a duplicate horn—
Astarte’s bediamonded crescent
Distinct with its duplicate horn.

Poe compares its passionate brilliance to cooler, more composed Dian, the horned crescent Moon, and urges Psyche forward:

Let us on by this tremulous light!
Let us bathe in this crystalline light!

But Psyche, who knows better, is terrified, and this being Poe, the adventure doesn’t end well…

Kateřina Machytková

RUDOLF STEINER’S CALENDAR OF THE SOUL
translated
(with added titles) by Roy Sadler
ADVENT IV… CHRISTMAS
The Birth Of The Spirit Child, Our Higher Self
v38

I feel the Spirit Child set free
from spell in womb of soul;
in heart’s bright radiance
from seed of Holy Cosmic Word
the heaven’s fruit of hope
is growing into farthest worlds
rejoicing from my being’s ground in God.

Thinking was first mentioned in verse 28, when its radiance
‘solves life’s riddles, and lifts the wish-fulfilling wings, left lame by hope’.
Conception for the Spirit Child in heaven’s fruit of hope came in mid July.
The Spirit’s Gift
v15

Enchanted in the glory of the world
I feel the weaving of the spirit;
it’s veiled my own being
in drowsiness of sense
to give to me the strength
that in my narrow bounds
I’m powerless to give myself.


Odilon Redon

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day 

 ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY


Abraham and the Three Angels ~Rembrandt

According to Rudolf Steiner’s spiritual research in the original Calendar of the Soul today is the Birthday of Abraham interestingly regarded as the father of the faithful by all 3 monotheistic religions: Judaism, Christianity, & Islam


Abraham and Lot by Wenceslaus Hollar

Birthday of Lot, nephew of Abraham

Also celebrated today: O Radix Jesse

O Radix Jesse, qui stas in signum populorum,
super quem continebunt reges os suum,
quem Gentes deprecabuntur:
veni ad liberandum nos, jam noli tardare.

O Root of Jesse, standing as a sign among the peoples;
before you kings will shut their mouths,
to you the nations will make their prayer:
Come and deliver us, and delay no longer.

Isaiah had prophesied: “A shoot shall come out from the stock of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots.” Isaiah 11:1 “On that day the root of Jesse shall stand as a signal to the peoples; the nations shall inquire of him, and his dwelling shall be glorious.” Isaiah 11:10 Jesse was the father of King David, & Micah had prophesied that the Messiah would be of the house and lineage of David & be born in David’s city, Bethlehem (Micah 5:2). see Also: Isaiah 45:14, Isaiah 52:15 & Romans 15:12

150 – Deathday of Clement of Alexandria. His parents were educated pagans, having rejected paganism as a young man due to its perceived moral corruption, he travelled in Greece, Asia Minor, Palestine & Egypt. In his Protrepticus he displays an extensive knowledge of Greek mythology & mystery religions, which could only have arisen from the practice of his family’s religion. In Greece, he encountered the Ionian theologian, Athenagoras of Athens; while in the east, he was taught by the Assyrian, Tatian, & a Jew, Theophilus of Caesarea. In around 180, Clement reached Alexandria, where he met Pantaenus, who taught at the Catechetical School of Alexandria. Clement studied under Pantaenus, & was ordained to the priesthood by Pope Julian before 189.

As his three major works demonstrate, Clement was influenced by Hellenistic philosophy to a greater extent than any other Christian thinker of his time, & in particular by Plato & the Stoics. His secret works, which exist only in fragments, suggest that he was also familiar with pre-Christian Jewish esotericism & Gnosticism. In one of his works he argued that Greek philosophy had its origin among non-Greeks, claiming that both Plato & Pythagoras were taught by Egyptian scholars. Among his pupils were Origen & Alexander of Jerusalem. Clement is regarded as a Church Father & is venerated as a saint in Coptic Christianity, Ethiopian Christianity & Anglicanism

1776 – Thomas Paine publishes a series of pamphlets in The Pennsylvania Journal entitled “The American Crisis“. The first was released during a time when the Revolution was still viewed as an unsteady prospect. The opening lines are as follows: “These are the times that try men’s souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman”.

The pamphlet, read aloud to the Continental Army on December 23, 1776, three days before the Battle of Trenton, attempted to bolster morale as well as shame neutrals & loyalists toward the cause: “Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph”.

Along with the patriotic nature of The American Crisis, it displayed Paine’s strong deist beliefs, inciting the laity with suggestions that the British are trying to assume powers that only God should have. Paine states that he believes God supports the American people, “that God Almighty will not give up a people to military destruction, or leave them unsupportedly to perish, who have so earnestly and so repeatedly sought to avoid the calamities of war, by every decent method which wisdom could invent“.

Paine believes that Britain is essentially trying to enslave America. See The American Crisis – Common Sense pamphlet – The Age of Reason

1848 – Deathday of Emily Brontë, English novelist & poet

1907 – 239 coal miners die in the Darr Mine Disaster in Jacobs Creek, Pennsylvania

1915 – Birthday of Édith Piaf, French singer-songwriter & actress

1927 – Three Indian revolutionaries, Ram Prasad Bismil, Roshan Singh & Ashfaqulla Khan are executed by the British Empire

1932 – BBC World Service begins broadcasting as the BBC Empire Service

1941 –Adolf Hitler appoints himself as head of the Oberkommando des Heeres

1972 –The last manned lunar flight, Apollo 17, crewed by Eugene Cernan, Ronald Evans, & Harrison Schmitt, returns to Earth

1974 – Nelson Rockefeller is sworn in as Vice President of the United States under President Gerald Ford under the provisions of the 25th Amendment to the United States Constitution

2012 – Park Geun-hye is elected the first female president of South Korea

Kristena West

Special Free 30 minute Online Winter Solstice Festival – Monday, 20 December 2021

9 am PT / 10 am MT / 11 am CT / 12:00 ET

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/266986103?pwd=bXU4a0EvMmJkMDZTR0Rqcm0xZ0pUZz09

Join us as we gather for 30 minutes to honor the Solstice – and give thanks to the good spirits that guide our Spiritual Practice group = 6BE (Steiner’s 6 Basic Exercises)

Welcome & lighting of the candle by Angela Foster

Leading Thoughts & a reading for 5 voices: CHAOS & THE COEL COETH INCANTATION by Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, with Rosemary, Timothy, Angela, Julie

Art by Kristena West – 8 minutes of silence to turn our collective attention to the spiritual world offering our gratitude for the guidance and love that is woven throughout our practice group.

We’ll end the silence with music brought by Julie Morris before we close the call.

Thursday 23 December 2021 – The Eve of the Eve –
11 am PT / 12 pm MT / 1 pm CT / 2 pm ET / 7 pm UTC

A Christmas Festival with Christian Community Priest Rev. Jeana Lee, 
Movement with Lucien Dante Lazar 


‘Divine Love and the Holy Child Within’

This will be a hybrid in-person & Zoom event
Featuring our 2 camera technology with Mary Spalding

Doors open at 12:30 pm (Zoom Room open 12:45 pm for Social time)
Snacks to Share Encouraged

Suggested donation $15.00 – 
At the door 
or via the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal donation site –
*Please make a note on the first line – type in: “Christmas Fest”!
The Festival will be recorded

Time: Dec 23, 2021 01:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=Vk1XcDJqT0lKeHYzWXZJNlRYNlRvZz09
Meeting ID: 705 293 1041
Passcode: Christmas

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

LAST DAY TO REGISTER 21 December

The Epic of Gilgamesh
Storytelling during the Holy Nights 2021-2022
Hosted by the Anthroposophical Society in America 

”The purpose of a story is to be an ax that breaks up the ice within us.”
~ Franz Kafka

Click to Register! 

All around the world the season of midwinter is the traditional time for community bonding through storytelling. In laying the groundwork for the 100-year anniversary of the Christmas Conferencewe bring the ancient Sumerian saga “The Epic of Gilgamesh” to life. Rudolf Steiner explored this story in Occult History during the Holy Nights of 1910; and again with the lectures “World History in the Light of Anthroposophy” given during those fateful Holy Nights in 1923 for the re-founding of the Society. 

The Epic of Gilgamesh is perhaps the oldest written tale on Earth. The Sumerian version dates from around 3000 B.C. Later it was compiled from 12 clay tablets written in Akkadian cuneiform. 

It is the “Hero’s Journey” of human evolution, a story of friendship, and a quest for the meaning of life – revealing Steiner’s core mission of bringing karma and reincarnation to the west. 

Myths, fairytales, historical epics, and sagas open us up to powerful archetypes behind the human condition, revealing clues to ourselves – from the past, the present, and the future. What will we uncover about ourselves and each other during this year’s Holy Nights adventure in storytelling?

Tune in for any or all of the episodes of this dramatic reading, re-worked by Hazel Archer from various translations, and featuring friends from around the world.

WhatThe Epic of Gilgamesh: Story Telling during the Holy Nights hosted by the ASA, Hazel Archer, and friends.

Time: 22 minutes daily at 9 am PT / 10 am MT / 11 am CT / 12 pm ET / 5 pm UTC

Dates:  December 24, 2021- January 5, 2022 for 13 consecutive days  
Can’t join us live? No problem. Each gathering will be recorded and posted on our Holy Nights page (link will be emailed upon registration).

HowRegister Here!  Then check your email for confirmation with the Zoom registration link. 

Cost: This event is free with suggested donations of $25, $50, $100
Your donations help us create events like this one!
Register Here! 
www.anthroposophy.org/holynights

Eurythmy for the Holy Nights with Jan Ranck
‘Tuning to the Stars’:
Sacred Geometry, the Planets and the Zodiac

LIVE IN-PERSON 26-30 Dec. 2021
at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago 4 pm – 5 pm
And at 7pm on 31 Dec. as part of our Annual NYE Gathering (details below)

$100 for all 6 sessions, or $22 for each individual session.

Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal
or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org
(Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “Holy Nights Eurythmy”)

Cash at the door, or send a check to:
Rudolf Steiner Branch
4249 North Lincoln Avenue
Chicago, IL 60618-2953
USA

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

* Jan Ranck – Born in the USA, Jan Ranck studied music and comparative arts at Indiana University in Bloomington. She accompanied the London Stage Group on their 1976 USA tour and went on to study eurythmy at the Eurythmeum in Dornach with Lea van der Pals, where she subsequently taught. In 1984 she joined the faculty of The London School of Eurythmy. She left there to complete her eurythmy therapy training in Stuttgart in 1989, moving afterward to Israel, where she founded and directed the Jerusalem Eurythmy Ensemble (1990) and the Jerusalem Academy of Eurythmy (1992) and was an instructor in the Jerusalem Waldorf Teacher Bachelor Program in David Yellin Academic College from 1999. Jan has held Master Classes at various venues worldwide, including the Goetheanum and the MA Program in Eurythmy held at Emerson College and Spring Valley. She is the representative for Israel in the International Eurythmy Therapy Forum.

Friday 31 December 2021
Doors open at 6:30 pm 

Join us for our Annual NYE Conscious Community Gathering –
The Theme for 2022 is Cabaret – a Cultural Sharing!

All are invited to take the stage with an offering.

Circles Edge & other Waldorf alum will also perform

Please bring Food & Drink to share

$20 Cash at the door or Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org
(Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “NYE”)

All proceeds go to support the Rudolf Steiner Branch – the young People hosting & The Band (Can’t make it? send a $ gift PayPal)

7 – 8 pm – Holy Nights Eurythmy with Jan Ranck (separate fee $22 see above)

8 pm – Potluck Social

8:30 pm – Circles Edge & Friends warm the stage & host the open mic

10:10 pm – Thought-Seed Circle

10:30 pm – Clean-up…;)

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

Ready or not

Sergie Blakion

Beloved Friends – These are the darkest days, the longest nights, fraught with internal midnights – when it’s easy to forget the bright crystal radiance of the newborn Sun – that is yet to come.

Yet, when we have the valor to embrace our darkest spaces -the fierce onslaught of restless tossing – we will deepen into the boundless birthing. Softening until we are ripe, like pomegranates that seep & pulse ruby red – an opening of the dark wound to light.

May grace chime in our bell-hollows, so that Night Herself can become the conduit to the new.

Yes, the Great Shift is happening, ready or not, here I come.

Closer & closer – a blending of the dark & light, out pictured as a cosmic conversation in the sunset sky.

Come on, lets uncover our head & go out into the night, to hula-hoop the rings of Saturn round glad hips, while balancing Jupiter on our held-high-head as a benevolent crown.

Align the solar system by straightening our collective spine as we pass thru the star portal – a ticklish bellybutton in the world moment.

Drink it all in – the Milky Way is pouring from our pineal gland – to activate our inner eye.

And the Helpers enter with our next inhalation. Breathe them in, & sing them out, in a frosty becoming.  The Christmas Star is meant to re-tune our mind to your heart –

Together we become – the new variant – the human evolution revolution.

~hag

Kristena West

Special Free 30 minute Online Winter Solstice Festival – Monday, 20 December 2021

9 am PT / 10 am MT / 11 am CT / 12:00 ET

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/266986103?pwd=bXU4a0EvMmJkMDZTR0Rqcm0xZ0pUZz09

Join us as we gather for 30 minutes to honor the Solstice – and give thanks to the good spirits that guide our Spiritual Practice group = 6BE (Steiner’s 6 Basic Exercises)

Welcome & lighting of the candle by Angela Foster

Leading Thoughts & a reading for 5 voices: CHAOS & THE COEL COETH INCANTATION by Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, with Rosemary, Timothy, Angela, Julie

Art by Kristena West – 8 minutes of silence to turn our collective attention to the spiritual world offering our gratitude for the guidance and love that is woven throughout our practice group.

We’ll end the silence with music brought by Julie Morris before we close the call.

18 December 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Full Moon tonight 11:35 pm CT. Bella Luna shines between the horntip stars of Taurus, Beta and Zeta Tauri. It’s at apogee, making this a “mini-moon,” very slightly smaller than average: the opposite of a “supermoon” at perigee.

By midnight the Moon is very high in the south, not far from the zenith. The full Moon of the Christmas season rides higher across the sky at midnight than at any other time of year, thus “giving lustre of midday to objects below.”

Why? December is the month of the solstice, when the Sun is farthest south in the sky. So, this is when the full Moon (opposite the Sun) is farthest north. In making its way across the night sky, it behaves as a pale, cold imitation of the June Sun six months ago.

Lord Fredrich Leigh

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

1271 – Kublai Khan renames his empire “Yuan” officially marking the start of the Yuan dynasty of Mongolia & China

1803 – Deathday of Johann Gottfried Herder, German philosopher, theologian, & poet – associated with the periods of Enlightenment, Sturm und Drang, & Weimar Classicism.

1829 – Deathday of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, biologist, & academic – an early proponent of the idea that evolution occurred & proceeded in accordance with natural laws. He gave the term biology a broader meaning by coining the term for special sciences, chemistry, meteorology, geology, & botany-zoology

1863 – Birthday of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria. Rudolf Steiner has some very interesting things to say about his assassination  

1865 – US Secretary of State William Seward proclaims the adoption of the Thirteenth Amendment, prohibiting slavery throughout the USA

1878 – Birthday of Joseph Stalin, 4th Premier of the Soviet Union

Image result for Paul Klee,

1879 – Birthday of Paul Klee, Swiss-German painter & educator

Image result for 1958 – Project SCORE, the world's first communications satellite, is launched

1958 – Project SCORE, the world’s first communications satellite, is launched

1966 – Saturn’s moon Epimetheus is discovered by astronomer Richard Walker

1972 –President Richard Nixon announces that the United States will engage North Vietnam in Operation Linebacker II, a series of Christmas bombings, after peace talks collapsed with North Vietnam on the 13th

Related image

1973 –Soyuz 13, crewed by cosmonauts Valentin Lebedev & Pyotr Klimuk, is launched from Baikonur in the Soviet Union

1990 – International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers & Members of Their Families is adopted.

1999 – NASA launches into orbit the Terra platform carrying five Earth Observation instruments

2006 – United Arab Emirates holds its first-ever elections

Holiday Market at the Rudolf Steiner Branch 
4249 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago
18 December 2021 – from 11 am – 4 pm

Handcrafted gifts, décor & toys
Featuring Live Music, Puppetry & Candle Dipping!!!

If you would like to be a vendor contact Elizabeth Kell
eilisaineariadne@gmail.com

Thursday 23 December 2021 – The Eve of the Eve –
11 am PT / 12 pm MT / 1 pm CT / 2 pm ET / 7 pm UTC

A Christmas Festival with Christian Community Priest Rev. Jeana Lee, 
Movement with Lucien Dante Lazar 


‘Divine Love and the Holy Child Within’

This will be a hybrid in-person & Zoom event
Featuring our 2 camera technology with Mary Spalding

Doors open at 12:30 pm (Zoom Room open 12:45 pm for Social time)
Snacks to Share Encouraged

Suggested donation $15.00 – 
At the door 
or via the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal donation site –
*Please make a note on the first line – type in: “Christmas Fest”!
The Festival will be recorded

Time: Dec 23, 2021 01:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=Vk1XcDJqT0lKeHYzWXZJNlRYNlRvZz09
Meeting ID: 705 293 1041
Passcode: Christmas

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

The Epic of Gilgamesh
Storytelling during the Holy Nights 2021-2022
Hosted by the Anthroposophical Society in America 

”The purpose of a story is to be an ax that breaks up the ice within us.”
~ Franz Kafka

Click to Register! 

All around the world the season of midwinter is the traditional time for community bonding through storytelling. In laying the groundwork for the 100-year anniversary of the Christmas Conferencewe bring the ancient Sumerian saga “The Epic of Gilgamesh” to life. Rudolf Steiner explored this story in Occult History during the Holy Nights of 1910; and again with the lectures “World History in the Light of Anthroposophy” given during those fateful Holy Nights in 1923 for the re-founding of the Society. 

The Epic of Gilgamesh is perhaps the oldest written tale on Earth. The Sumerian version dates from around 3000 B.C. Later it was compiled from 12 clay tablets written in Akkadian cuneiform. 

It is the “Hero’s Journey” of human evolution, a story of friendship, and a quest for the meaning of life – revealing Steiner’s core mission of bringing karma and reincarnation to the west. 

Myths, fairytales, historical epics, and sagas open us up to powerful archetypes behind the human condition, revealing clues to ourselves – from the past, the present, and the future. What will we uncover about ourselves and each other during this year’s Holy Nights adventure in storytelling?

Tune in for any or all of the episodes of this dramatic reading, re-worked by Hazel Archer from various translations, and featuring friends from around the world.

WhatThe Epic of Gilgamesh: Story Telling during the Holy Nights hosted by the ASA, Hazel Archer, and friends.

Time: 22 minutes daily at 9 am PT / 10 am MT / 11 am CT / 12 pm ET / 5 pm UTC

Dates:  December 24, 2021- January 5, 2022 for 13 consecutive days  
Can’t join us live? No problem. Each gathering will be recorded and posted on our Holy Nights page (link will be emailed upon registration).

HowRegister Here!  Then check your email for confirmation with the Zoom registration link. 

Cost: This event is free with suggested donations of $25, $50, $100
Your donations help us create events like this one!
Register Here! 
www.anthroposophy.org/holynights

Eurythmy for the Holy Nights with Jan Ranck
‘Tuning to the Stars’:
Sacred Geometry, the Planets and the Zodiac

LIVE IN-PERSON 26-30 Dec. 2021
at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago 4 pm – 5 pm
And at 7pm on 31 Dec. as part of our Annual NYE Gathering (details below)

$100 for all 6 sessions, or $22 for each individual session.

Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal
or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org
(Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “Holy Nights Eurythmy”)

Cash at the door, or send a check to:
Rudolf Steiner Branch
4249 North Lincoln Avenue
Chicago, IL 60618-2953
USA

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

* Jan Ranck – Born in the USA, Jan Ranck studied music and comparative arts at Indiana University in Bloomington. She accompanied the London Stage Group on their 1976 USA tour and went on to study eurythmy at the Eurythmeum in Dornach with Lea van der Pals, where she subsequently taught. In 1984 she joined the faculty of The London School of Eurythmy. She left there to complete her eurythmy therapy training in Stuttgart in 1989, moving afterward to Israel, where she founded and directed the Jerusalem Eurythmy Ensemble (1990) and the Jerusalem Academy of Eurythmy (1992) and was an instructor in the Jerusalem Waldorf Teacher Bachelor Program in David Yellin Academic College from 1999. Jan has held Master Classes at various venues worldwide, including the Goetheanum and the MA Program in Eurythmy held at Emerson College and Spring Valley. She is the representative for Israel in the International Eurythmy Therapy Forum.

Friday 31 December 2021
Doors open at 6:30 pm 

Join us for our Annual NYE Conscious Community Gathering –
The Theme for 2022 is Cabaret – a Cultural Sharing!

All are invited to take the stage with an offering.

Circles Edge & other Waldorf alum will also perform

Please bring Food & Drink to share

$20 Cash at the door or Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org
(Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “NYE”)

All proceeds go to support the Rudolf Steiner Branch – the young People hosting & The Band (Can’t make it? send a $ gift PayPal)

7 – 8 pm – Holy Nights Eurythmy with Jan Ranck (separate fee $22 see above)

8 pm – Potluck Social

8:30 pm – Circles Edge & Friends warm the stage & host the open mic

10:10 pm – Thought-Seed Circle

10:30 pm – Clean-up…;)

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 


Weather

Jane Hudson

Ok so lets’ talk about the weather.

For me it is not an idle chit chat, no small talk – it is a way of observing & communicating with the elemental beings. What are they trying to say to us?

Because I make it a point to commune with these beings, in all weathers, I have always been fascinated with Ben Franklin who made a number of discoveries & tinkered with various inventions that had to do with Weather – a topic that continuously fascinated him.

He gave us the famous quote: Some are weatherwise; some are otherwise.”

I don’t know much about what folks call ‘geo-engineering’ or weather warfare, or  electromagnetic weapons like HAARP (High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program) Some researchers go so far as to claim that HAARP technologies are used to cause earthquakes, hurricanes, tsunamis, to disrupt global communications systems, etc…

These researchers point to major aspects of the program which are still kept secret for alleged reasons of “national security.” Yet the U.S. patent of a key developer of HAARP & other documentary evidence support these claims. And there is no doubt that electromagnetic weapons capable of being used in warfare do exist. The capability of influencing & yes controlling human emotions has been studied by the military & intelligence agencies of the world for many decades. Here is the abstract of U.S. patent number 5,159,703: “A silent communications system in which nonaural carriers, in the very low or very high audio frequency range or in the adjacent ultrasonic frequency spectrum, are amplitude or frequency modulated with the desired intelligence and propagated acoustically or vibrationally, for inducement into the brain, typically through the use of loudspeakers, earphones or piezoelectric transducers. The modulated carriers may be transmitted directly in real time or may be conveniently recorded and stored on mechanical, magnetic or optical media for delayed or repeated transmission to the listener.”

Ok so we could easily fall down the rabbit hole here. But I bring this up because of the strange weather we have been experiencing.

Yes, we know tornadoes happen, but not usually in December…At least 70 people were killed & countless homes destroyed when tornadoes — one of which traveled on the ground for a record 227 miles — swept across 6 states on December 10 & 11, 2021.

Then on Dec. 15th approximately 100 million people were under a high-wind weather alert – stretching from eastern Arizona to upstate New York.

Wind gusts up to 100 mph, along with the unprecedented winter tornadoes, rain storms in Southern California, & in Colorado a wildfire risk – the severest in 20 years & simply unheard of for mid-December.

What was it like by you?

The National Weather Service has never issued a tornado watch or warning during the month of December. In fact, Minnesota has zero confirmed tornadoes on record during the month of December. Yet on Wednesday 15 Dec. there was 10 inches of snow on the ground on top of the tornado threat. The rare overlap of the tornado risk over deep snow cover leaves meteorologists wondering…

Meanwhile across the Plains & Upper Midwest we are experiencing Highs 20 to 40 degrees above average – we were in the mid 60’s when the big winds came our way on Wed. 15 December 2021.

Interesting to read that as far away as the Australian island state of Tasmania at the same time ‘a freak accident on the school field. While some schoolchildren were in the inflatable bouncy castle, the police said, “a significant” gust of wind sent it, flying into the air. Nine students plunged more than 30 feet to the ground, 5 were killed.’

During our Family Farm Initiative meeting last night Mark & Petra Zinniker spoke about how the high-winds were the elementals trying to get our attention.

And I woke up thinking about how during the laying of the Foundation Stone for the 1st Goetheanum in 1913, Rudolf Grosse reported: “The sky had clouded over during the day & when we were all gathered, a great wind arose. Thunder rumbled in the distance, lightning again & again rent the darkness & the landscape seemed eerie”

And then I thought of how at the re-founding of the Anthroposophical Society during the Christmas Conference in December 1923, when Rudolf Steiner laid the Foundation Stone of Love into the hearts of the members, he included 3 times the phrase: “In East, West, North, South, May human beings hear it” – a call to acknowledge & listen to the elemental beings.

Friends, It’s time we hear it…

~hag

17 December 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Tonight is the eve of the Full Cold Moon, also called the Moon Before Yule, or the Long Night Moon.

Hibiki Miyazaki

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day 

 ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Feast day of Lazarus – The biblical narrative of the raising of Lazarus is found in chapter 11 of the Gospel of John. Lazarus is introduced as a follower of Jesus, who lives in the town of Bethany near Jerusalem, the brother of Mary & Martha. The sisters send word to Jesus that Lazarus, “he whom thou lovest,” is ill. Instead of immediately traveling to Bethany, Jesus intentionally remains where he is for two more days before beginning the journey.

When Jesus arrives in Bethany, he finds that Lazarus is dead & has already been in his tomb for four days. He meets first with Martha & then Mary in turn. Martha laments that Jesus did not arrive soon enough to heal her brother &Jesus replies with the well-known statement, “I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die”. Later the narrator here gives the famous simple phrase, “Jesus wept”.

In the presence of a crowd of mourners, Jesus comes to the tomb. Over the objections of Martha, Jesus has them roll the stone away from the entrance to the tomb & says a prayer. He then calls Lazarus to come out (“Come forth”) & Lazarus does so, still wrapped in his grave-cloths. Jesus then calls for someone to remove the grave-cloths, & let him go.

The narrative ends with the statement that many of the witnesses to this event “believed in him.” Others are said to report the events to the religious authorities in Jerusalem.

The Gospel of John mentions Lazarus again in chapter 12. Six days before the Passover on which Jesus is crucified, Jesus returns to Bethany & Lazarus attends a supper that Martha, his sister, serves. Jesus & Lazarus together attract the attention of many & the chief priests consider having Lazarus put to death because so many people are believing in Jesus on account of this miracle.

The miracle of the raising of Lazarus, the longest coherent narrative in John aside from the Passion, is the culmination of John’s “signs”. It explains the crowds seeking Jesus on Palm Sunday, & leads directly to the decision of Caiaphas & the Sanhedrin to kill Jesus.

It is notable that at John 11:11, after being told by His disciples to fear those who would kill Him, & after the parable about living in darkness, Jesus references his own parable & states that Lazarus sleeps, & that He will go “wake him up”. The disciples thought Jesus meant Lazarus was actually sleeping in verse 12. Then, in verse 14, Jesus speaks plainly & tells them that “Lazarus has died”. This is to be clear that Lazarus has died in the flesh, & is not sleeping or unconscious.

Lazarus is spoken of by Rudolf Steiner as becoming John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, & formerly as Hiram Abiff the Master Builder of Solomon’s Temple & Christian Rosenkreutz.

Antoine Callet

497 BC – The first Saturnalia festival was celebrated in ancient Rome.

1790 – The Aztec calendar stone is discovered at El Zócalo, Mexico City.

1819 – Simón Bolívar declares the independence of Gran Colombia in Venezuela. Gran Colombia was the most prestigious country in Spanish America. John Quincy Adams, then Secretary of State & future president of the United States, claimed it to be one of the most powerful nations on the planet. This prestige, attracted to the nation unionist ideas of independence movements in Cuba, the Dominican Republic & Puerto Rico, which sought to form an associated state with the republic.

1862 –General Ulysses S. Grant issues General Order No. 11, expelling Jews from parts of Tennessee, Mississippi, & Kentucky.

1830 – Death Day of Simón Bolívar, 2nd President of Venezuela

Dotyk - Největší záhada historie. Byl Kašpar Hauser šílenec, nebo  nepohodlný dědic

1833 – Deathday of Kaspar Hauser, the rightful Prince of Baden, died on this after a murder attempt on 12.12.1833

The individuality that hides behind the Kaspar Hauser veil is a being which worked inspiringly into the Rosicrucian connection from the beginning, and then on 29th September 1812, incarnated as the son of Grand Duke Karl of Baden and his wife Stephanie de Beauharnais. Kaspar Hauser had an important mission of esoteric Christianity to fulfil….It is not a question of who …Kaspar Hauser was, but of what was to have been achieved by [him].

According to these thoughts of Rudolf Steiner, to concern oneself with Kaspar Hauser is to concern oneself with the future. Steiner draws attention to when Kaspar incarnated : Michaelmas in the year 1812; where : Baden in southern Germany; and the importance of his mission. To the above indications he added that Kaspar Hauser had been an angelic being and that he had been unable to discover any previous incarnation of Kaspar Hauser since Atlantis.

It was in Karlsruhe on 25th January 1910 that Rudolf Steiner gave the first public lecture of which we have a record about the Second Coming of Christ, which would take place, not in the physical body but in the etheric world, the spiritual region where, according to Steiner , angelic beings are most active between the Earth and the Moon. He said that this would commence in the 1930s, citing especially the years 1933, 1935 and 1937, which was, incidentally, a century after the death and slandering of Kaspar Hauser. It was also in Karlsruhe the following year at Michaelmas, almost exactly 99 years after Kaspar’s birth, that Steiner compared for the first time the methods of the Rosicrucians with those of the Jesuits. In those same lectures of 1911 given at Kaspar Hauser’s birthplace, Rudolf Steiner revealed one of the most profound teachings of esoteric Christianity – that of the nature of the human ‘Phantom’, or the Resurrection body.

Karl Heyer reports the well-authenticated remark of Steiner ‘s that: “if Kaspar Hauser had not lived and died as he did, the contact between the earth and the heavenly would have been completely severed.” 

What was it that created the bridge that linked the second crucifixion and the second resurrection of Christ ? Steiner does not spell it out, but well over 100 years have now passed since the death of Kaspar Hauser, and so  we can now at least put the question: was it not the sacrificial life and death of the angelic being of Kaspar Hauser there in the land of the Germans, the crossroads region of the heart of Europe,  that built a spiritual bridge between heaven and earth at the time of Europe’s darkest materialism of mind and secured for mankind in the 20th century and for centuries afterwards the possibility of seeing the resurrected Etheric Christ?

And if Kaspar Hauser’s sacrificial life is so intimately related to this Second Crucifixion and Second Resurrection of Christ (Second Coming), does this not suggest that his spiritual significance is of a most profound and awesome nature? ~Terry Boardman

1873 – Birthday of Eleanor Charlotte Merry, an English poet, artist, musician & anthroposophist with a strong Celtic impulse & interest in esoteric wisdom. She studied in Vienna & met Rudolf Steiner in 1922 after becoming interested in his teachings. She went on to organize Summer Schools where Steiner gave lectures, & was secretary for the World Conference on Spiritual Science in London in 1928

Eleanor Charlotte Kynaston grew up in a liberal educational environment, her father being the well known classical scholar & professor of Ancient Greek, Herbert Snow aka KynastonIt was only at the age of 13 that she began to attend a regular school. This was also when she began to take a passionate interest in music. Two years later, her father became Deacon of Durham, so Eleanor grew up close to the beautiful cathedral. She was able to read the manuscripts that were kept in the monastic library, walking up & down amongst the Norman columns of the cathedral & experienced something of a real, concrete history, something completely different from what she read in her schoolbooks. It was the myths & legends that captivated her, & she learned by heart Tennyson’s King Arthur.

The stream of scholars & theologians that entered their house fed her spiritual longings.

As she grew up, she sought a career as singer, wanting to study music & art. At 19, she left home for a course of study in Vienna, which led not only to a fine command of the German language & development of her musical skills but also placed her in a kind of artistic-aesthetic inner crisis. Soon after her return to England, she married the well-known Oxford surgeon Merry, to whose professional commitments Eleanor Merry was to devote much of her energy besides the rearing of their son & daughter.

She learnt about Theosophy at the beginning of World War I when a copy of the “Secret Doctrine” of H.P. Blavatsky was sent her by persons unknown. As she read it, she felt as if guided by some unseen hand, & studied further works of Annie Besant & other Theosophists. After the war, she was made aware of Rudolf Steiner’s Knowledge of the Higher Worlds. In January 1922 she met Daniel Nicol Dunlop in London for the first time. He was reading a lecture of Rudolf Steiner’s to the anthroposophical group there. A few months later, her husband died of pneumonia, after which she had her first personal conversation with DN Dunlop. Dunlop was still fired up with gratitude over his meeting with Rudolf Steiner some few weeks previously.

She took part in the conference “Spiritual Values in Education” in Oxford that August, where she met Rudolf Steiner personally for the first time. She saw him first in a corridor & by his gait & the manner in which he looked at her, she had the impression: “He knows where he is going.”

She assisted D.N. Dunlop in the preparation of the subsequent Summer School in Penmaenmawr the following year, where a further conversation with Rudolf Steiner took place in which he recommended to her the new techniques in painting that had been developed under his guidance. She was soon exhibiting publicly in London& elsewhere. He also advised her to form as strong a bond as possible with Dunlop. This summer school, devoted to the theme “The Evolution of Consciousness” was felt by Steiner to be a milestone in the development of the anthroposophical movement.

Eleanor was present at the founding of the new General Anthroposophical Society at the Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland around New Year 1923/24.

The theme of the ensuing Summer School at Torquay in 1924, “True and False Paths in Spiritual Investigation” (GA 243), stemmed from a conversation she had with Rudolf Steiner on this occasion.

In her further work in Britain after Rudolf Steiner’s death, she wholeheartedly supported D.N. Dunlop’s efforts to create an open, inclusive & at the same time spiritually founded continuation of the anthroposophical work. She acted as secretary of the anthroposophical World Conference in London of 1928 &wrote a play around the figure of King Arthur for the youth conference initiated by David Clement in Glastonbury in 1932. More immediately than anyone, she experienced the dramatic events affecting Daniel Dunlop between 1929, when he became General Secretary of the Anthroposophical Society in Great Britain & the spring of 1935, when he was expelled from the General Anthroposophical Society & died a short while later. After his death, she maintained intimate friendships with her half-sister, Marna Pease, Walter Johannes Stein & particularly Eugen Kolisko, whom she helped to build up the School for Spiritual Science, wrote numerous articles for their magazine “The Modern Mystic“, & wrote down the biographical notes Kolisko dictated to her. In the 1940s she led a painting school together with Maria Schindler as well as working with her on the book Pure Colour (1946), leading to large public exhibitions.

Holiday Market at the Rudolf Steiner Branch 
4249 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago
18 December 2021 – from 11 am – 4 pm

Handcrafted gifts, décor & toys
Featuring Live Music, Puppetry & Candle Dipping!!!

If you would like to be a vendor contact Elizabeth Kell
eilisaineariadne@gmail.com

Thursday 23 December 2021 – The Eve of the Eve –
11 am PT / 12 pm MT / 1 pm CT / 2 pm ET / 7 pm UTC

A Christmas Festival with Christian Community Priest Rev. Jeana Lee, 
Movement with Lucien Dante Lazar 


‘Divine Love and the Holy Child Within’

This will be a hybrid in-person & Zoom event
Featuring our 2 camera technology with Mary Spalding

Doors open at 12:30 pm (Zoom Room open 12:45 pm for Social time)
Snacks to Share Encouraged

Suggested donation $15.00 – 
At the door 
or via the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal donation site –
*Please make a note on the first line – type in: “Christmas Fest”!
The Festival will be recorded

Time: Dec 23, 2021 01:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=Vk1XcDJqT0lKeHYzWXZJNlRYNlRvZz09
Meeting ID: 705 293 1041
Passcode: Christmas

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

The Epic of Gilgamesh
Storytelling during the Holy Nights 2021-2022
Hosted by the Anthroposophical Society in America 

”The purpose of a story is to be an ax that breaks up the ice within us.”
~ Franz Kafka

Click to Register! 

All around the world the season of midwinter is the traditional time for community bonding through storytelling. In laying the groundwork for the 100-year anniversary of the Christmas Conferencewe bring the ancient Sumerian saga “The Epic of Gilgamesh” to life. Rudolf Steiner explored this story in Occult History during the Holy Nights of 1910; and again with the lectures “World History in the Light of Anthroposophy” given during those fateful Holy Nights in 1923 for the re-founding of the Society. 

The Epic of Gilgamesh is perhaps the oldest written tale on Earth. The Sumerian version dates from around 3000 B.C. Later it was compiled from 12 clay tablets written in Akkadian cuneiform. 

It is the “Hero’s Journey” of human evolution, a story of friendship, and a quest for the meaning of life – revealing Steiner’s core mission of bringing karma and reincarnation to the west. 

Myths, fairytales, historical epics, and sagas open us up to powerful archetypes behind the human condition, revealing clues to ourselves – from the past, the present, and the future. What will we uncover about ourselves and each other during this year’s Holy Nights adventure in storytelling?

Tune in for any or all of the episodes of this dramatic reading, re-worked by Hazel Archer from various translations, and featuring friends from around the world.

WhatThe Epic of Gilgamesh: Story Telling during the Holy Nights hosted by the ASA, Hazel Archer, and friends.

Time: 22 minutes daily at 9 am PT / 10 am MT / 11 am CT / 12 pm ET / 5 pm UTC

Dates:  December 24, 2021- January 5, 2022 for 13 consecutive days  
Can’t join us live? No problem. Each gathering will be recorded and posted on our Holy Nights page (link will be emailed upon registration).

HowRegister Here!  Then check your email for confirmation with the Zoom registration link. 

Cost: This event is free with suggested donations of $25, $50, $100
Your donations help us create events like this one!
Register Here! 
www.anthroposophy.org/holynights

Eurythmy for the Holy Nights with Jan Ranck
‘Tuning to the Stars’:
Sacred Geometry, the Planets and the Zodiac

LIVE IN-PERSON 26-30 Dec. 2021
at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago 4 pm – 5 pm
And at 7pm on 31 Dec. as part of our Annual NYE Gathering (details below)

$100 for all 6 sessions, or $22 for each individual session.

Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal
or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org
(Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “Holy Nights Eurythmy”)

Cash at the door, or send a check to:
Rudolf Steiner Branch
4249 North Lincoln Avenue
Chicago, IL 60618-2953
USA

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

* Jan Ranck – Born in the USA, Jan Ranck studied music and comparative arts at Indiana University in Bloomington. She accompanied the London Stage Group on their 1976 USA tour and went on to study eurythmy at the Eurythmeum in Dornach with Lea van der Pals, where she subsequently taught. In 1984 she joined the faculty of The London School of Eurythmy. She left there to complete her eurythmy therapy training in Stuttgart in 1989, moving afterward to Israel, where she founded and directed the Jerusalem Eurythmy Ensemble (1990) and the Jerusalem Academy of Eurythmy (1992) and was an instructor in the Jerusalem Waldorf Teacher Bachelor Program in David Yellin Academic College from 1999. Jan has held Master Classes at various venues worldwide, including the Goetheanum and the MA Program in Eurythmy held at Emerson College and Spring Valley. She is the representative for Israel in the International Eurythmy Therapy Forum.

Friday 31 December 2021
Doors open at 6:30 pm 

Join us for our Annual NYE Conscious Community Gathering –
The Theme for 2022 is Cabaret – a Cultural Sharing!

All are invited to take the stage with an offering.

Circles Edge & other Waldorf alum will also perform

Please bring Food & Drink to share

$20 Cash at the door or Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org
(Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “NYE”)

All proceeds go to support the Rudolf Steiner Branch – the young People hosting & The Band (Can’t make it? send a $ gift PayPal)

7 – 8 pm – Holy Nights Eurythmy with Jan Ranck (separate fee $22 see above)

8 pm – Potluck Social

8:30 pm – Circles Edge & Friends warm the stage & host the open mic

10:10 pm – Thought-Seed Circle

10:30 pm – Clean-up…;)

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

Christic Yoga

Dear friends – I am finding this 3rd week of Advent to be particularly challenging. After taking in some thoughts given in the comments – thank you Kyle, Maverick, Steve, Nicholas, Rick…I will continue to grapple…Please add your comments below to further the conversation…

Focus: The Astral World
Symbol: the animal
Abandoned by: Guardian Angels
Virtues: Bravery, fortitude and presence of mind
Beware of temptation to lose your self-control

Ok, so I am learning how in the Air trial we see how we imprint or project ourselves & our thoughts into the world, both good & bad. The world thinks in us & we think in the world.

Ordinary sense based thinking has to be silenced so that it can unite with a harmonious will. When thought is willed it becomes an organ of perception. It becomes conscious of the way our Astral body penetrates into the world & becomes one with all we see.

When we do this we realize that we are the creators of the future, we imprint outwardly what we think inwardly & this becomes the outer world that we will face today – & even imprints our physical bodies in our next incarnation.

More & more it is being revealed that the Cyber World has 2 sides – it can be a tool for communion, or it can be used to further the advent of the ‘8th Sphere’ which has risen higher than ever before into the realm of the human soul – causing a kind of unconsciousness paralysis in the human will. This unconsciousness is the 1st layer – allowing the melding of human thought with demonic delusion to take place.

The only way to counteract the attacks on human thinking is to free it thru spiritual exercises that create a consciousness in all 3 soul forces, so that thinking becomes an awakened organ of will – in alignment with Divine Will.

Working with after images & complementary colors is the new Christic Yoga for this Michaelic age. We must use Lucifer’s gift of imagination as a tool – but we don’t use fantasy, we employ cognitive imagination to activate our Divine Will – this does not allow the Luciferic powers to interfere or the Ahrimanic beings to enslave.

We are meant to learn to breathe light in thru our transformed organ of thought & breathe it out thru our eyes – to shine healing grace out into the sense bound world.

When we look out into the world in this way we see how our soul can be a beacon of light revealing the spirit in all things so that we see the essence – We breathe light in & out! In this way we don’t see the physical world lit up only by electric light, but by our spiritual light.

But yes, my friends, in doing this we will also come face to face with all that is dark & imperfect in our soul. What lives inside us unconsciously is now lit up to be looked at – & we are faced with what we are. This is the first thing we see when we do these exercises.

We lose the floor from under our feet, we are up in the air without a foothold – we recognize the dross we carry unconsciously – which is what we imprint on the world around us.

Friends let’s break the spell that wants to keep us trapped in the 8th sphere – which is striving to be the new normal.

We must become capable of seeing this dross & transforming it in the light of Christ, so that by working on perfecting our lower desires, thru moral thinking, we can build together – the Temple of our true heart – where love lives.

This lecture by Rudolf Steiner explains it much better than I can: The Mission of the Archangel Michael. Lecture 6 – The Ancient Yoga Culture and the New Yoga Will. The Michael Culture of the Future, November 30, 1919

We shall have the possibility of grasping, the nature of the sense process of man in its relation to the outer world. Man’s conceptions are very coarse and clumsy, indeed, which maintain that the outer world merely acts upon us and we, in turn, merely react upon it. In reality, there takes place a soul process from the outside toward the inside, which is taken hold of by the deeply subconscious, inner soul process, so that the two processes overlap. From outside, cosmic thoughts work into us, from inside, humanity’s will works outward. Humanity’s will and cosmic thought cross in this crossing point, just as the objective and the subjective element once crossed in the breath. We must learn to feel how our will works through our eyes and how the activity of the senses delicately mingles with the passivity, bringing about the crossing of cosmic thoughts and humanity’s will. We must develop this new Yoga will. Then something will be imparted to us that of like nature to that which was imparted to human beings in the breathing process three millennia ago. Our comprehension must become much more soul-like, much more spiritual. If we learn, in nature, to receive the soul element together with sense perception, then we shall have the Christ relationship to outer nature. This Christ relationship to outer nature will be something like a kind of spiritual breathing process.”

16 December 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Left of Orion after dinnertime is the constellation Gemini. Castor and Pollux, the head stars of the Gemini stick-figure twins, are at its left end; the twins are lying on their sides. Castor is the higher one. Bella Luna crosses Taurus as it waxes toward full, on the night of the 18th.

Comet Leonard has been emerging just above the southwest horizon in evening twilight, a little bit higher each day

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

 ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

1770 – Birthday of Ludwig van Beethoven

1859 – Death day of Wilhelm Grimm, German anthropologist and author – the younger brother of Jacob Grimm, of the literary duo the Brothers Grimm.

1900 – Deathday of Karl Julius Schröer, Rudolf Steiner’s professor – Steiner speaks about him in his Karmic Relationships Lectures in Vol 4, lecture 10 his former incarnations as Plato / Hroswitha are given. He was the son of the educator and writer Tobias Gottfried Schröer (Socrates in a former life)

1901 – Birthday of Margaret Mead, American anthropologist and author

Holiday Market at the Rudolf Steiner Branch 
4249 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago
18 December 2021 – from 11 am – 4 pm

Handcrafted gifts, décor & toys
Featuring Live Music, Puppetry & Candle Dipping!!!

If you would like to be a vendor contact Elizabeth Kell
eilisaineariadne@gmail.com

Thursday 23 December 2021 – The Eve of the Eve –
11 am PT / 12 pm MT / 1 pm CT / 2 pm ET / 7 pm UTC

A Christmas Festival with Christian Community Priest Rev. Jeana Lee, 
Movement with Lucien Dante Lazar 


‘Divine Love and the Holy Child Within’

This will be a hybrid in-person & Zoom event
Featuring our 2 camera technology with Mary Spalding

Doors open at 12:30 pm (Zoom Room open 12:45 pm for Social time)
Snacks to Share Encouraged

Suggested donation $15.00 – 
At the door 
or via the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal donation site –
*Please make a note on the first line – type in: “Christmas Fest”!
The Festival will be recorded

Time: Dec 23, 2021 01:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=Vk1XcDJqT0lKeHYzWXZJNlRYNlRvZz09
Meeting ID: 705 293 1041
Passcode: Christmas

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

The Epic of Gilgamesh
Storytelling during the Holy Nights 2021-2022
Hosted by the Anthroposophical Society in America 

”The purpose of a story is to be an ax that breaks up the ice within us.”
~ Franz Kafka

Click to Register! 

All around the world the season of midwinter is the traditional time for community bonding through storytelling. In laying the groundwork for the 100-year anniversary of the Christmas Conferencewe bring the ancient Sumerian saga “The Epic of Gilgamesh” to life. Rudolf Steiner explored this story in Occult History during the Holy Nights of 1910; and again with the lectures “World History in the Light of Anthroposophy” given during those fateful Holy Nights in 1923 for the re-founding of the Society. 

The Epic of Gilgamesh is perhaps the oldest written tale on Earth. The Sumerian version dates from around 3000 B.C. Later it was compiled from 12 clay tablets written in Akkadian cuneiform. 

It is the “Hero’s Journey” of human evolution, a story of friendship, and a quest for the meaning of life – revealing Steiner’s core mission of bringing karma and reincarnation to the west. 

Myths, fairytales, historical epics, and sagas open us up to powerful archetypes behind the human condition, revealing clues to ourselves – from the past, the present, and the future. What will we uncover about ourselves and each other during this year’s Holy Nights adventure in storytelling?

Tune in for any or all of the episodes of this dramatic reading, re-worked by Hazel Archer from various translations, and featuring friends from around the world.

WhatThe Epic of Gilgamesh: Story Telling during the Holy Nights hosted by the ASA, Hazel Archer, and friends.

Time: 22 minutes daily at 9 am PT / 10 am MT / 11 am CT / 12 pm ET / 5 pm UTC

Dates:  December 24, 2021- January 5, 2022 for 13 consecutive days  
Can’t join us live? No problem. Each gathering will be recorded and posted on our Holy Nights page (link will be emailed upon registration).

HowRegister Here!  Then check your email for confirmation with the Zoom registration link. 

Cost: This event is free with suggested donations of $25, $50, $100
Your donations help us create events like this one!
Register Here! 
www.anthroposophy.org/holynights

Eurythmy for the Holy Nights with Jan Ranck
‘Tuning to the Stars’:
Sacred Geometry, the Planets and the Zodiac

LIVE IN-PERSON 26-30 Dec. 2021
at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago 4 pm – 5 pm
And at 7pm on 31 Dec. as part of our Annual NYE Gathering (details below)

$100 for all 6 sessions, or $22 for each individual session.

Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal
or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org
(Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “Holy Nights Eurythmy”)

Cash at the door, or send a check to:
Rudolf Steiner Branch
4249 North Lincoln Avenue
Chicago, IL 60618-2953
USA

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

* Jan Ranck – Born in the USA, Jan Ranck studied music and comparative arts at Indiana University in Bloomington. She accompanied the London Stage Group on their 1976 USA tour and went on to study eurythmy at the Eurythmeum in Dornach with Lea van der Pals, where she subsequently taught. In 1984 she joined the faculty of The London School of Eurythmy. She left there to complete her eurythmy therapy training in Stuttgart in 1989, moving afterward to Israel, where she founded and directed the Jerusalem Eurythmy Ensemble (1990) and the Jerusalem Academy of Eurythmy (1992) and was an instructor in the Jerusalem Waldorf Teacher Bachelor Program in David Yellin Academic College from 1999. Jan has held Master Classes at various venues worldwide, including the Goetheanum and the MA Program in Eurythmy held at Emerson College and Spring Valley. She is the representative for Israel in the International Eurythmy Therapy Forum.

Friday 31 December 2021
Doors open at 6:30 pm 

Join us for our Annual NYE Conscious Community Gathering –
The Theme for 2022 is Cabaret – a Cultural Sharing!

All are invited to take the stage with an offering.

Circles Edge & other Waldorf alum will also perform

Please bring Food & Drink to share

$20 Cash at the door or Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org
(Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “NYE”)

All proceeds go to support the Rudolf Steiner Branch – the young People hosting & The Band (Can’t make it? send a $ gift PayPal)

7 – 8 pm – Holy Nights Eurythmy with Jan Ranck (separate fee $22 see above)

8 pm – Potluck Social

8:30 pm – Circles Edge & Friends warm the stage & host the open mic

10:10 pm – Thought-Seed Circle

10:30 pm – Clean-up…;)

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

Inside/Outside

Você sabe o que é uma egrégora?
Dante Sagredo

Greetings friends – Today brings a 10:10 Testament: 

After tuning into the 10:10 How To many folks shared how they approach co-creating the egregore. Quite a few like to make a sacred space 1st. Some by acknowledging the elemental forces; others thru calming their breath, making a circle of protection, or by lighting a candle.

Some of us are visualizing working directly with the Spiritual Beings of the season. Most everyone reports picturing all of us shining together to make the earth glow with our positive intentions & common light.

Rebecca Buerendale

It’s true, the human being is meant to become a co-worker with spiritual beings -a participate in Divine spiritual activity.

When we strive to ‘know thyself’, we see our reflection everywhere in the world – our neighbor, the stars, the clouds, the kingdoms of nature. Within us, we are called to strengthen & balance our world of soul. These 2 worlds belong to one another -& only thru their mutual interaction does evolution proceed.

Harriett Forman Barrett

Outside – in space, the infinite world is unfolding. Within – our soul-world must also be revealed to our consciousness. We do not always notice that what lives within us shoots forth & blends with what is outside in the world at large, we are not always aware that we are the stage on which this union is carried out. 

All ‘magic’ is based on this – Which can be defined as: ‘the Art & Science of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will’.

Of course, it is necessary that we strive to be morally mature, so that what is not purified within us shouldn’t get mixed up with what is in the world without thought of the consequences & the right soul mood of service. Then we can participate in a selfless way with Divine spiritual activity. This is the right hand path of magic. This is where freedom enters. With this we become free human beings.

We have to regard the whole universe not only as a stage, but as a field for co-operation. We start to see how we can live into the meaning of life. To know that Christ is the meaning of life

Andrew McDonnell

More & More the world is divided into two opposing camps & we must stand in the middle, in order to bring them together. How can we become united? – How can the Christ be awakened in the consciousness of humanity?

Manani Lingerfelt

We must begin to grasp the great responsibility we have – then we can start to know – that thru our striving we are pollinating seeds – We are broadcasting seeds that spring up for the spiritual worlds, kernels that would not be able to develop without our human will.

Tiana Marie

Can we see that: Our inner world becomes the outer world – & The outer world becomes our inner world..?

To unite the Christic impulse with what is external – to make inward what is external – brings healing & balance — these are the 2 directions in which humanity makes progress in evolution.

Adelaide Parker Brown

Dear friends, This is an affirmation of our work with the 10:10 Thought-Seed – that we are called to be co-workers with the Spiritual world to unfold our highest destiny. These thoughts are confirmed & inspired by the following lecture from Rudolf Steiner:

Monte Rio

“We can now estimate what it means when, directing our gaze into vastness of space we say: It is Divinity that fills it, and Divinity is that which must be united with the Earth-seed. “In me is the meaning of life!” — man may exclaim. The gods have set before them certain aims; but they have also chosen the stage on which these aims are to be carried out. The souls of men are the stage. Therefore, if the human soul looks but deeply enough into itself, and does not only try to solve problems in the vastness of space, it finds within itself the stage where gods are accomplishing their deeds — and man himself is taking part in them. That is what I tried to express in the words which can be found in my Mystery Play, The Soul’s Probation how in man’s inner being the gods work, how the meaning of the world finds expression in the soul of man and how the meaning of the world will live on in the soul of man. What is the meaning of life? It is, that this meaning lives in man himself. This I tried to express in the words which the soul addresses to itself:

Within thy thinking cosmic thought doth live,
Within thy feeling cosmic forces play,
Within thy will do cosmic beings work;
Abandon thou thyself to cosmic thought,
Experience thyself through cosmic force,
Create thyself anew from cosmic will.
End not at last in cosmic distances,
By fantasies of dreamy thought beguiled.
Do thou begin in farthest spirit-realms
And end in the recesses of thy soul.
The plan Divine then shalt thou recognise
When thou hast realised thy Self in thee.

That, my dear friends, is the meaning of life, as man must understand it at present…It is of the essence of real love that it is also an equilibrium of polarities. At the point where anthroposophical thoughts find entrance to a soul, the other pole is stimulated and agreement found. It is this that can work like an anthroposophical “Music of the Spheres.” When we work thus in harmony with the spiritual world, when we really are living anthroposophical life, we also live united in this life…

Nina Kathrine

Such spiritual subjects are an expression of the Spirit of Love and are consecrated to the Spirit of Love amongst true anthroposophists. This love, through the touchstone we possess, will be instrumental in the exchange of our spiritual content; it will be something through which we not only receive, but through which we are also stimulated more and more to anthroposophical effortsIn this way Anthroposophy will become a means of spreading a love that touches the inmost depths of the human soul. Such love lives on. For as members of the Anthroposophical Movement, we have something that causes the love of those who are separated in space to endure until Karma again unites us on the physical plane. So we remain united and find the true cause for remaining so in the fact that with all the best in our souls, with the best of our spiritual powers, we have together risen to Divine spiritual heights. In this way, we also desire, my dear friends, to continue to be united with one another.” ~ Rudolf Steiner, On the Meaning of Life, LECTURE 2 ‘Human Participation in Evolution’ 24th May, 1912

Dear friends, During this 3rd week of Advent, while facing the Air Trail, we can ground our thoughts in the 10:10 Thought-Seed

see you there

~hag

~earthsky

15 December 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: It’s the comet Leonard’s time to shine with the Planetary beings of Jupiter, Saturn & Venus (Occult Mercury)

POD (Poem Of the Day)

~Celestial fire descend
Burnish bright as copper our diamond mind
Carry the ideals of Archangels into our body
So we may uplift the sky, rend the veil & reveal the temple true…
~hag

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

Holiday Market at the Rudolf Steiner Branch 
4249 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago
18 December 2021 – from 11 am – 4 pm

Handcrafted gifts, décor & toys
Featuring Live Music, Puppetry & Candle Dipping!!!

If you would like to be a vendor contact Elizabeth Kell
eilisaineariadne@gmail.com

Thursday 23 December 2021 – The Eve of the Eve –
11 am PT / 12 pm MT / 1 pm CT / 2 pm ET / 7 pm UTC

A Christmas Festival with Christian Community Priest Rev. Jeana Lee, 
Movement with Lucien Dante Lazar 


‘Divine Love and the Holy Child Within’

This will be a hybrid in-person & Zoom event
Featuring our 2 camera technology with Mary Spalding

Doors open at 12:30 pm (Zoom Room open 12:45 pm for Social time)
Snacks to Share Encouraged

Suggested donation $15.00 – 
At the door 
or via the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal donation site –
*Please make a note on the first line – type in: “Christmas Fest”!
The Festival will be recorded

Time: Dec 23, 2021 01:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=Vk1XcDJqT0lKeHYzWXZJNlRYNlRvZz09
Meeting ID: 705 293 1041
Passcode: Christmas

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

The Epic of Gilgamesh
Storytelling during the Holy Nights 2021-2022
Hosted by the Anthroposophical Society in America 

”The purpose of a story is to be an ax that breaks up the ice within us.”
~ Franz Kafka

Click to Register! 

All around the world the season of midwinter is the traditional time for community bonding through storytelling. In laying the groundwork for the 100-year anniversary of the Christmas Conferencewe bring the ancient Sumerian saga “The Epic of Gilgamesh” to life. Rudolf Steiner explored this story in Occult History during the Holy Nights of 1910; and again with the lectures “World History in the Light of Anthroposophy” given during those fateful Holy Nights in 1923 for the re-founding of the Society. 

The Epic of Gilgamesh is perhaps the oldest written tale on Earth. The Sumerian version dates from around 3000 B.C. Later it was compiled from 12 clay tablets written in Akkadian cuneiform. 

It is the “Hero’s Journey” of human evolution, a story of friendship, and a quest for the meaning of life – revealing Steiner’s core mission of bringing karma and reincarnation to the west. 

Myths, fairytales, historical epics, and sagas open us up to powerful archetypes behind the human condition, revealing clues to ourselves – from the past, the present, and the future. What will we uncover about ourselves and each other during this year’s Holy Nights adventure in storytelling?

Tune in for any or all of the episodes of this dramatic reading, re-worked by Hazel Archer from various translations, and featuring friends from around the world.

WhatThe Epic of Gilgamesh: Story Telling during the Holy Nights hosted by the ASA, Hazel Archer, and friends.

Time: 22 minutes daily at 9 am PT / 10 am MT / 11 am CT / 12 pm ET / 5 pm UTC

Dates:  December 24, 2021- January 5, 2022 for 13 consecutive days  
Can’t join us live? No problem. Each gathering will be recorded and posted on our Holy Nights page (link will be emailed upon registration).

HowRegister Here!  Then check your email for confirmation with the Zoom registration link. 

Cost: This event is free with suggested donations of $25, $50, $100
Your donations help us create events like this one!
Register Here! 
www.anthroposophy.org/holynights

Eurythmy for the Holy Nights with Jan Ranck
‘Tuning to the Stars’:
Sacred Geometry, the Planets and the Zodiac

LIVE IN-PERSON 26-30 Dec. 2021
at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago 4 pm – 5 pm
And at 7pm on 31 Dec. as part of our Annual NYE Gathering (details below)

$100 for all 6 sessions, or $22 for each individual session.

Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal
or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org
(Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “Holy Nights Eurythmy”)

Cash at the door, or send a check to:
Rudolf Steiner Branch
4249 North Lincoln Avenue
Chicago, IL 60618-2953
USA

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

* Jan Ranck – Born in the USA, Jan Ranck studied music and comparative arts at Indiana University in Bloomington. She accompanied the London Stage Group on their 1976 USA tour and went on to study eurythmy at the Eurythmeum in Dornach with Lea van der Pals, where she subsequently taught. In 1984 she joined the faculty of The London School of Eurythmy. She left there to complete her eurythmy therapy training in Stuttgart in 1989, moving afterward to Israel, where she founded and directed the Jerusalem Eurythmy Ensemble (1990) and the Jerusalem Academy of Eurythmy (1992) and was an instructor in the Jerusalem Waldorf Teacher Bachelor Program in David Yellin Academic College from 1999. Jan has held Master Classes at various venues worldwide, including the Goetheanum and the MA Program in Eurythmy held at Emerson College and Spring Valley. She is the representative for Israel in the International Eurythmy Therapy Forum.

Friday 31 December 2021
Doors open at 6:30 pm 

Join us for our Annual NYE Conscious Community Gathering –
The Theme for 2022 is Cabaret – a Cultural Sharing!

All are invited to take the stage with an offering.

Circles Edge & other Waldorf alum will also perform

Please bring Food & Drink to share

$20 Cash at the door or Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org
(Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “NYE”)

All proceeds go to support the Rudolf Steiner Branch – the young People hosting & The Band (Can’t make it? send a $ gift PayPal)

7 – 8 pm – Holy Nights Eurythmy with Jan Ranck (separate fee $22 see above)

8 pm – Potluck Social

8:30 pm – Circles Edge & Friends warm the stage & host the open mic

10:10 pm – Thought-Seed Circle

10:30 pm – Clean-up…;)

For more info. Contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg