Dearly Beloved – It is an occult truth that after 100 years an esoteric initiative has an opportunity to be renewed. I often refer to the Rosicrucian impulse that puts forth the imagination of ‘the opening of the tomb of Christian Rosenkreutz’ – a way of signifying the evolution of human consciousness.
But with the opportunity to lift the veil comes a great moral obligation, for as Spiritual Science points out, there are dangers – great perils – if we are not prepared thru a conscious working, to build a foundation of ethical uprightness, that allows us to selflessly Cross the Threshold to enter & effectively work in the Spiritual World, not only for the individual, but for all those karmicly connected to the same esoteric initiative. For as Steiner tells us: It is the mutual taking on of karma that is created in such a community. (The Circle)
And so, in discerning whether or not we are meant to take up the Circle work, which demands, not only making a sacred vow to the spiritual world; we must also be consciously willing to take on this karma, bearing the joys & suffering of every member, living & dead, now, & for lifetimes to come. No small thing.
This makes our personal commitment to consistently & earnestly work with the Circle meditations of vital importance! Our integrity, or lack thereof, has a ripple effect that touches every member of the Circle, the Spiritual World, & the evolution of, not only humankind, but of the Earth which is destined to become a new Sun – the New Jerusalem.
One of the original Circle Members Herbert Hahn tells us: “While, on the one side, the meditations are for the individual & the community an organ of higher spiritual development, they also serve, on the other side, the whole Earth. Steiner explained that the moral forces of the Earth today are so threatened with corruption, ruination, that this meditative activity has an immensely significant healing effect for the Earth. This is especially true when, as happens in a spiritual community, the meditative forces potentize in their effect.”
And so you can imagine that whatever is put into, or not put into, the meditative practice, is potentized, & written into the ethers, for good or ill – affecting all realms.
Hahn goes on: “In this connection Rudolf Steiner also mentioned The Christian Community that was starting. It is to be thanked as a helper in this service for the preservation of the moral forces of the Earth…
Steiner went on to say that when we do this community-meditation, it will bring about a deeper connection of the core our being with our sheaths. This can however, because it is a birth process, be connected with feelings of suffering & pain…
Rudolf Steiner said all this with especially great earnestness. One had the impression of looking at great dangers that are coming toward us out of a time that is striding on into one-sidedness.
As he gave us the meditations in an unforgettable spirit-mood…he said something deeply stimulating: These meditations, when used correctly, could become something like windows into the spiritual world. The words & pictures give form to only half of what was to be entrusted to us. The other half we were to find ourselves through spiritual activity..
In the moment in which the meditations were given…Steiner said: “You can consider this thusly, that I was given the charge to bring this to you.”
For the writer of these lines, this was the highest impression that I ever received of the person of Rudolf Steiner. More & more I was allowed to experience how the suprasensible world revealed its full power in the work & appearance of Rudolf Steiner himself, as a high spiritual individuality.
In this moment of the giving of the meditations however, as if through a bolt of lightning, a spiritual background – which one can only divine – behind the bearer of the modern initiation, was torn open. In this experience, there was an indescribable spirit-aroma that remains connected with these meditations forever.”
As I mentioned in the last 2 articles around the origins & The Circle Jubilee, the giving of the meditation took place on Friday the 13th of October. The actual Founding – when the 12 Circle members took the solemn vow; came on Monday 16 October 1922. (Interesting to remember that the inital arrest of the Templars was on Friday, October 13, 1307)
Lehrs tells us: “Before the founding is described, an incident that took place in the meantime must be reported, because this caused Dr. Steiner to begin the Foundation in a specific way & to indicate an incumbent task for the whole of the Anthroposophical Movement.
Here is reported that a few of those foundingthe Youth Grouphad the intention-with the agreement of Dr. Rittelmeyer & Dr. Steiner-to participate in the first Act of Consecration of Man, at which others in addition to just the Priests could be present, on Sunday 15 October. This was the preparation by the inner circle of Priests for the first public celebration to be held at Advent in the wider communities.
In the conversation beforehand, in which the details of the service were made known, Emil Bock called for all, through their participation in the service, to commit themselves to building up The Christian Community. As a result of this, the Youth Group founders withdrew their intention to participate.”
I imagine that Emil Bock’s ill placed enthusiasm for his work made the young people feel unfree, so perhaps an opportunity for them, out of themselves, to bring: an incumbent task for the whole of the Anthroposophical Movement, to bear in the world at that time was missed.
This incumbent task, which I see as a calling for Christology to be more visible in Anthroposophy; acknowledged perhaps as one of the Sections in the Movement, is calling to be taken up now as part of the renewal forces available at this Centennial milestone – a chance to resurrect what lay dormant in the tomb.
Tomorrow we follow up with details the Founding of The Circle
Until soon
~hag
19 October 2022 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Vega is the brightest star very high toward the west these evenings. To Vega’s right look for Eltanin, the nose of Draco the Dragon. The rest of Draco’s fainter, lozenge-shaped head is a little farther behind. Draco always eyes Vega as they wheel around the sky. The main stars of Vega’s own constellation, Lyra, extend to Vega’s left by half as far as the distance from Vega to Eltanin.
RUDOLF STEINER’S CALENDAR OF THE SOUL translated (with added titles) by Roy Sadler MICHAELMAS 111 Soul Sunpower’s Awakening v28 I can, revived within, now feel my own wide breadth of being, my strength of sun-empowered soul whose radiance of thinking solves life’s riddles and lifts the wish-fulfilling wings left lame by hope.
The COTS verses can also be imagined in a 24 hour rhythm. The summer is soul’s sleeptime in the drowsiness of senses. This verse, the first mention of active human thought, can be a meditation every morning on awakening, and the opposite verse (the Southern Hemisphere one now), with an alteration of its first line, ‘Arising into senses’ all-enwoven outwardness’, and its third line changed from a present to a coming tense, can be a meditation every evening as one prepares to sleep for which one must release one’s thoughts.
EASTER II (revised as a meditation into sleep) Spirit World Participation v2 To sleep in all-enwoven outwardness thought’s power sheds its separate strand; the spirit worlds will find again their human offspring, whose soul must find her seed in them but in herself the fruit.
At Ascensiontide, v7 (28/4), the Tenor calls for foresight (“Ahnung”, that I alays translate with an ah, a sound for the future): …now you, my foresight, dawn in me your star and my divining, firmly as of right, replace the power of thought that in the senses’ glory leaves me.
In v8 at Whitsun (Pentecost): …the senses’ power grows; it presses thinking down to dimness of a dream.
As the second quarter of the year begins in v14 (28/2) the Baritone receives cosmic thought: …there comes in all the senses’ glory cosmic thought’.
And now in v28, the 2nd verse of the COTS’ 2nd half of the year, the daytime’s sun-empowered thought awakens in the Soprano’s voice.
Support Velsum purchase their new EP on bandcamp – Velsum is an Anthroposophical musical initiative formed through Ultra-Violet Archer and Lucien Dante Lazar. A true vocal presence is the union of past and future. Through harmony, generous creativity, and uplifting social transformation, Velsum invites the universal human being into the individual.
Pablo Picasso, La Ronde de la Jeunesse (The Youth Circle)
Dear friends – a few young people have written in asking me to share more background around the ‘Wandervogel’ Youth Movement & how it was manifesting in the Anthroposophical Movement of Steiner’s day to bring forth “der Jugendkreis” (the Youth Circle) You can read about the Circle Jubilee here.
The best source is in “Esoteric Lessons Vol. 3 – 1913-1923, (CW 266/3) from the Collected Works of Rudolf Steiner” giving a moving account of the origins & development of the Esoteric Youth Group. Friends, I wholeheartedly recommend reading these recollections, notes & testimonies from the young people who were part of this revolutionary time. It seems especially important for those who are members of The Circle now to review this material, since as Lehrs related, Steiner gave the advice that members “should reflect again & again upon the foundational impulse of the Group”
I will highlight a few details to help bring some perspective of what was living in the souls of these young people 100 years ago; who may be seeking to work with us from the spiritual world today.
The catastrophe of the World War proved that the old societal conditions were decadent, no longer serving the striving human being. Young people especially yearned for a new social practice. In 1919 the Movement for the Threefold Social Organism arose out of Rudolf Steiner, which really called to these young people. From this came many Anthroposophical Student Groups. In 1920 the Association for Anthroposophical Collage Studies was founded. This led to the East-West Congress in Vienna in June 1922, where a group of young people set up a meeting with Rudolf Steiner.
Steiner described the youth as Wondervogel = Migratory birds – “a movement arising internationally out of elemental forces”, to announce the end of the Kali Yuga, in a series of lectures called ‘Youth and the Etheric Heart’ given especially for the young people who were grappling with many hardships & questions of their destiny following the disaster of World War I.
The young people responded by getting together & writing ‘circulars’ which were popular at that time, to try to explain what was living in them. These reports were often read at various Anthroposophical General Meetings. One such circular by Otto Palmer, Jr. spoke about the origins of the Youth Movement: “…we must see it above all as a protest that came to life in the youth against the old branch life that has up until now been customary in the Anthroposophical Society. Indeed, there actually does live in the youth something that feels the need to have Anthroposophy not be just something we do on Sunday afternoons (not like wearing it as jewelry or decoration on Sunday), but rather to bring everything that is given in Anthroposophy into life and to make it into practice…instead of a lecturer speaking from a podium, with the audience just listening, now people have joined together who want to work together on a theme…”
Another circular by Ehrenfried Pfeiffer said: “…If we ourselves add ability to our willing, then the fight against the old thinking can be taken up everywhere…”
After Steiner gave the lectures called: Mystics after Modernism to the Berlin Youth Group, Ernst Lehrs, Wilhelm Rath, Karin & Wilhelm Selling, & Kurt Walther, became inspired by the “Friend of God from Oberland” & his ‘circle of 12 Friends of God’. This enkindled in them & others the ideal of building a similar circle of Anthroposophical youth to meet the modern age. They hoped to create this ideal thru the newly formed “Bund fur freies Geistesleben (Association for Independent Spiritual Life)
Rath wrote to Lehrs: “…The request is that, since we want for all the future to come to an intensive, living working-together, that Rudolf Steiner give us the possibility of uniting meditatively at a specific time in rhythmic sequence – even though we are separated in space – by giving us a unifying meditation into which we can immerse ourselves in the morning or evening. This idea seems important to me.”
Other young people were more concerned with asking Steiner about practical career advice. So, as Rath wrote in his book “Mein Weg zum Kreis” (My way to the circle): “…the result was a long wrestling with the formation of the question to be put to Dr. Steiner”.
Over 80 young people, from the ages of 18-25, & about 20 older folks came to Stuttgart for the Youth Course, 3-5 October 1922, in what came to be called “Becoming the Archangel Michael’s Companion”. Steiner understood that the young people saw “fixed programs as something for which the time is past”, so Herr Doctor suggested they meet together to discuss what they wanted the 1st lecture to be about, & then they could go from there. The Official local Society reps were offended that they weren’t included, although Steiner did invite the Vorstand & the college of teachers from the Waldorf School.
According to “Enstehungsgeschichte des Jugendkreises” (The history of the origin of the youth group by Ernst Lehrs) the young people were split, ‘one group wanted to bring a question about building an esoteric community, the other group rejected this flatly & demanded that only a question that concerns the pedagogical realm should be brought. Finally, they agreed on a neutrally formulated question. When it was presented to Rudolf Steiner, he appeared to be disappointed by it, so Wilhelm Rath felt compelled to bring the idea forward about the esoteric community, which Dr. Steiner was immediately willing to do.’ He suggested that the large group consult once more & that only those who wanted to take up the esoteric idea should come to the next meeting.
After much debate the majority separated off, & the Youth Course, called today THE YOUNGER GENERATION, GA 217, itself addressed their career questions; while a group of 12 went on to meet with Dr. Steiner on Friday the 13th October 1922. (Interesting to think back on that Friday the 13th October in 1307, when King Philip IV of France, in league with Pope Clement V, ordered all the Knights Templars to be rounded up & thrown into prison)
From Herbert Hahn we hear: “We gathered in a festive, expectant mood. Dr. Steiner entered together with Frau Dr. Steiner, with a noticeably earnest bearing. He held in his hand a violet leather-bound book, out of which later he read the meditations & let them be copied. Upon entering the room, he paused a moment in the doorway & counted us as he pointed a finger at each of us. Thereby, we ourselves became aware for the first time that there were twelve of us. Then he opened the book & said with a deep, calm voice: “I have the task of communicating the following to you”.
Dear friends – I was especially looking forward to attending our Christian Community Church this morning since Rev. Jeana Lee & several members of our congregation have just returned from the celebration of the founding of the Christian Community, which occurred on 16 September 1922.
And today on 16 October 2022 we are honoring the Anniversary of the Founding of the Esoteric Youth Circle, an independent, self-directed community of meditants – a path of inner striving as a service – ‘a social working in the suprasensible‘ – established thru Rudolf Steiner in 1922.
The task of the Circle member is an inner contemplation of mantras to be done 3 X’s a day, morning, noon & evening, using the spiritual content that came thru Dr. Steiner, to create an etheric relationship with others working with the mantras here on earth, as well as those across the Threshold, in collaboration with Powerful Spiritual Beings, (Steiner explained: What you seek is to find a friend in the spiritual world)to foster the Christic progress in the evolution of humanity.
Steiner told the original members that this: meditation is a fulfilling of the Spiritual Will that the Time Spirit bears within itself. When such meditation is practiced, a spiritual force is able to work into the earthly events. Spiritual worlds want to work into earthly events today, but they can do this only when, through human meditation, space is created for it…the power of meditating such a meditation in common increases by potentization.
To be clear – the members of The Circle do not constitute some spiritual or social elite, but join together because an inner urge, stemming perhaps from karma, compels them to search for an inner, meditative relationship to Anthroposophy that prepares them 1st thru an individual inner development, which then benefits the wider society as a whole, to receive the Michaelic stream of spiritual working that is seeking to enter the evolution of Humanity.
At the Founding, Steiner tells us: It is the mutual taking on of karma that is created in such a community.
Like in The Mystery Dramas, Steiner tells us must realize that: what we ourselves do within the community bears no fruit for us ourselves, but for others, & that the fruits for us come from others.
After the Founding, Steiner annouced: What has taken place now is a first in the post-Christian era: human beings themselves chose, out of freedom before the spiritual world, to join together esoterically’.
Dear freinds – The Circle did not start out to be, & was never intended as a ‘Secret Society’; but unfortunately, as can be the case with the School of Spiritual Science & its First Class, or in the ‘Sections’, some people have fed into this false notion.
The Circle is not an institution in the world. It should have no hierarchy, no guru’s, it is not an organization or a separate society.The Circle has never had, nor should it have, any ‘leaders’ or select representatives. (but again unfortunately some people do aggrandize their ‘seniority’, so beware) There is no constitution or code of conduct, or enforced bylaws. No papers are signed, no proof of membership. No financial transactions of any kind occur.
The Circle grows by word of mouth, mostly thru conversations between people. It’s been interesting to see how this impulse, living as it does in the etheric & astral worlds, & in the “I” of many striving souls, has been called to become so much more present these days, as we come to this Centennial milestone.
Meetings, (in many cases these days on zoom) occur as a way of sharing research, personal experience with The Circle Meditation as seen thru the seasonal round, or working with the esoteric lessons which Steiner specificly gave them – And as the Good Doctor emphasized to the original members “To get to know each other well” thru biography work, as way of building a ‘new kind of community‘of equal peers.
Unlike other communities, where a person’s actions & judgments can be subject to censure or sanctions, The Circle is meant to leave each person completely free, never exerting any kind of pressure or influence on other members. There is no ‘acting on behalf of the Circle’.
The many quotations here & below, from the initial conversations with Rudolf Steiner, clarifies the relationship of the members to each other:
To unite together through a mutual promise in striving for a common spiritual purpose, and in doing so to nevertheless leave each one completely free in their actions and their judgments – a community founded upon such precepts is something quite new in the development of humanity and something which is needed today as a matter of utmost necessity.
The Circle was never an official part of the Anthroposophical Society, it is independent in the same sense as the Christian Community. But the history shows that Rudolf Steiner was asked by the Circle members during the Christmas Conference whether they were meant to continue in light of the new impulse from the refounding of the Anthroposophical Society. In response, he gave them a 2nd Esoteric Lesson on the morning of 30 December 1923 – before Continuing the Foundation Meeting – deepening their insights to further their work on into the future.
Also interesting is that among the other mantras that make up that Christmas Conference lesson, Steiner spoke the 3 so-called “Tablets” asking the Cirlce members to write them down, & use them in their daily work. This was before Steiner had established the First Class.
Rudolf Steiner never intended that the Circle should stop its work or be dissolved, which he confirmed to Maria Röschl when she asked him about it.
Steiner also told the members: The community will never die out. With the 1st community members who reincarnate, the community returns to Earth.
Therefore The Circle will continue to exist, according to Steiner, beyond death, as long as there are people that find its task meaningful, are prepared to carry thru with the daily meditations, & are called to pass it on to others.
When, after much deliberation one determines that The Circle work is part of their destiny, the person makes ‘the pledge’ – to serve the spiritual world.
Steiner affirmed: By persevering with the exercises we have a chance to stand up to Ahrimanic powers that no one person can withstandalone.
Below is a letter from Ernst Lehrs, one of the founding members of the Esoteric Youth Circle, where he answers a question posed to Alan Howard, one of the editors of the Autumn 1979 newsletter of the Anthroposophical Society in America. This was written a few weeks before his death.
“I am writing in response to your inquiry in the Autumn ’79 issue of the American Newsletter concerning what seems to you to be a “secret Society” within the general Anthroposophical Movement.
As an original member of this “Circle”, which came into being with the help of Rudolf Steiner 56 years ago, I feel obliged to convey as far as possible a picture fitting its true nature. At the time of the so-called Youth Course (available in English under the title “The Younger Generation,”) held by Rudolf Steiner in 1922, some of us who had carried the initiative for this course out of impulses shared and agreed by us during a preparatory period, approached Rudolf Steiner in all modesty about the possibility of receiving common material for inner work.
Our question had been prompted by realizing the rapid crumbling of human society in its different spheres. This was at the same time that the inevitable failure of the Threefold Commonwealth Movement became apparent. We felt that something quite definite ought to be undertaken which would ensure the continuity of the anthroposophical substance regardless of external conditions. For this purpose, purely individual meditations carried out for one’s own spiritual progress – indispensable though these are – could not suffice. What we were striving for, or so we put it, was a Schulung als Dienst (a path of inner striving as a service), whereby one wishes to serve the Spirit of the Time, i.e. Michael.
After a number of preparatory conversations between Rudolf Steiner and those of us who had requested them, a meditative content was passed on to us which Rudolf Steiner said was given im Auftrag der geistigen Welt (on behalf of the spiritual world). At the same time, the manner of its use as well as indications of how to pass on this meditative work to others striving in a similar direction was explained to us by Rudolf Steiner. He then further helped the birth of this community and said that we should regard it as having been gestiftet by the spiritual world itself. (Rudolf Steiner distinguished clearly between begründen – to found, and stiften – to institute, to endow; the former refers to an impulse originating in the physical world, the latter to one coming directly out of the spiritual world working down into the physical.)
This took place in a solemn act. Rudolf Steiner also handed down to the initial group a pledge which, by being read in the presence of the others who already belong to the Circle, constitutes a commitment purely to the spiritual world. We were the first to do so on Rudolf Steiner’s advice by reading these words to one another.
Subsequently, Rudolf Steiner met twice with the members of this community endowing them with two esoteric lessons, (the 1st was in Stuttgart on 13 July 1923, which BTW Steiner also gave to the Priests) the second of which was held on December 30, 1923, this is during the Weihnachtstagung (the Christmas Foundation Meeting). It took place in a room of the Glashaus; and on this occasion, Frau Ita Wegman and Frau Marie Steiner accompanied him as guests. From what Rudolf Steiner said with regard to Dr Wegman’s presence, we realized that this work was in a way linked to the newly formed Hochschule (School for Spiritual Science).
In subsequent months, Rudolf Steiner made himself available to us whenever required either personally until his illness, or in writing until shortly before his death. The Vorstand in Dornach was thoroughly informed about these matters to their complete satisfaction.
The connection between the members of this community is established solely through the same mantric words meditated by each individually. No earthly initiative is ever undertaken by its members by virtue of belonging to this community. In some places, friends foster meetings from time to time of those locally in reach. Here again, they do so following the advice by Rudolf Steiner to engage in conversations and Gespräch about spiritual matters, e.g. based on the content of the two esoteric lessons, if they wish to do so.
The community has no name of its own and Rudolf Steiner recommended that we should keep it so. However, in the opening part of the second lesson, he said, “I am addressing myself today to the youth in you. For you are after all the esoteric youth circle.” This has prompted some friends to refer to it as “der Jugendkreis” but usually when it is mentioned it is spoken of as “der Kreis” (The Circle).
I hope that through my description it has become clear that this community is in no way an institution on earth and that there is no secrecy about its work. Friends find this work who feel within themselves questions arising of a nature similar to those which have led to the original formation of this community. Experience has shown that individuals earnestly seeking answers to vital inner questions are often led by personal encounters to situations where this work may become known to them. It is then a matter of whether one is able, prepared and willing to undertake responsibly the specific meditative work described above. ~Ernst Lehrs, Advent 1979”
The history of ‘The Circle’ can be found in “Esoteric Lessons Vol. 3 – 1913-1923”. Other documents are at the Archives at the Goetheanum or the Rudolf Steiner Archives in Dornach.
Here are a few notes from the various preparatory discussions for the founding of the Group:
‘If I am to go into what I understand with the term “esoteric group” then let me say that if you want to take the esoteric earnestly, you must say to yourself that it is an action out of the impulses from the spiritual world. One can strive toward this. Anthroposophy is a path to this end. To build such a community would constitute a decision to set upon this path.
The spiritual is a living element & so such a group must not be something dead. The group must be a force-group. The health of each part is the health of the whole. It is the mutual taking on of karma that is created in such a community. There is then mutual suffering to live through, but also mutual joy. People must be treated like fellow human beings, with all their imperfections.
What you seek is to find a friend in the spiritual world. The important thing is to remain spiritually true to the friend once found. Therefore, the 1st requirement is that you learn quite precisely what spiritual loyalty is.
Your community will have in it something of the primordial mystery of all human community. This mystery is that, what we ourselves do within the community bears no fruit for us ourselves, but for others, & that the fruits for us come from others.
We must work for the progress of humanity – Just as the physical social life consists of deeds done together, so too we strive for common deeds in the spirit – thus actually, for a social working in the suprasensible.
We must endeavor to carry spirit into the furthest consequences of our actions. This alone – that we bring spirit & love into our will – can make it possible to stand firmly against being overrun by the cultural machine. Too few people today develop real initiative. There is a lot of willfulness, but little will.
The true meditation is a fulfilling of the spiritual will that the Time Spirit bears with itself. Where such meditation is practiced, a spiritual force is able to work into the earthly events. Spiritual worlds want to work in to earthly events today, but they can do this only when, through human meditation, space is created for it. Through meditation, something like an empty space comes about. Into this space, the spiritual beings can enter with their effects. And the power of meditating such a meditation in common increases by potentization.
When we do this community-meditation, it will bring about a deeper connection of the core of our being with our sheaths.
These meditations, when used correctly, could become something like windows into the spiritual world. The words & pictures given, form only half of what is to be entrusted to us. The other half we are to find ourselves through spiritual activity.
Each of you must feel joy for the success of the other. You must avoid every feeling of rivalry & have the awareness that what each of you accomplishes, you accomplish through the power of all of the others.
Uniting yourself through a mutual promise to strive toward a common spiritual goal – & leaving one another completely free in actions & judgements in life – such a community based on this is something completely new in the evolution of humanity. And it is what is most necessary today.
For someone who comes to specific results on the esoteric path, there is always the danger of delusions of grandeur. Such a community as yours can be a protection against this. For in it, you strive together to cross the threshold of the spiritual world. And there each of you has to say that you have the efforts of all the others to thank for what you have achieved personally.
Effects will arise in the destiny between human beings who are connected with us in the community physically & spiritually. The community will never die out. With the 1st community members who reincarnate, the community returns to Earth.
By persevering with the exercises we have a chance to stand up to Ahrimanic powers that no one person can withstand.
Through the reading of the oath given by Rudolf Steiner on 16 October 1922, in the presence of the others, the admittance into the community was effected.
And now consider your community as having been founded by the spiritual world itself…Now get to know each other well.
This gave us the idea to tell each other our biography at the mutual acceptance into membership.
What has taken place now is a 1st in the post-Christian era: human beings themselves chose, out of freedom before the spiritual world, to join together esoterically’.
The 12 founding members:
Daniel van Bemmelen, co-founder of the 1st Dutch Waldorf School
Georg Groot MD, 3-fold social order, co-worker in the Berlin Group of the College Association
Herbert Hahn, called by Steiner to teach at the Independent Waldorf School in Stuttgart
Ernst Lehrs, teacher at the Waldorf school in Stuttgart, served on the committee for the Independent Anthroposophical Society founded for the youth. Later taught in The Hague, London, & Aberdeen. Also taught with his wife Maria Roeschl in the Rudolf Steiner Seminar.
Rene Maikowski, business manager of the Association for Anthroposophical College Studies, also a Waldorf teacher.
Wilhelm Rath, bookseller, man of letters, farmer, was on the committee of the Independent Anthroposophical Society.
Wilhelm Selling, mechanical engineer, colonial officer in Africa, in charge of the Theosophical library, mentor of the youth work in Berlin
Karin Selling, part of the Scandinavian Theosophical Society, teacher at the Waldorf School in Stockholm
Emma Smit, teacher & organizer of the Independent school in The Hague
Maria Spira, came from the Zionist Youth Movement, married Wilhelm Rath
Albrecht Strohschein,Walter Johannes Stein, Karl König
Albrecht Strohschein, business man, 1st co-worker in the Der Kommenden (The Coming Day) in Stuttgart, student of psychology in Jena, co-founder of the therapeutic pedagogical movement
Kurt Walther, postal officer, lecturer, & leader of many courses, the successor of Marie Steiner in the Executive Council of the Anthroposophical Socety, married Wilhelm Selling’s sister ClaraSelling, who was part of Steiner’s household
Blessings as we take this impulse into the next Century & beyond…
TODAY on this Indigenous People’s Day – which also happens to be 10.10 ;I thought to share a little 10:10 Testament from our Thought-Seed Project to bring light in around our continued intention to visualize the human being as a Star & the Earth as a Sun; co-creating an ‘Egregore’ – our collective ‘Thought-Form’ of Good Will – our “key-call” to the powers on the Inner Planes, to enlist their aid – Everyday at 10:10 am / pm, in your time zone, wherever you are.
Our positive egregore grows between the material & spiritual worlds, connected to both, like a rainbow bridge in the etherial realm bringing the pot of gold to those who would look for it.
Folks have been asking for more insights into how to actually do the 10:10 Thought-Seed Experiment. Well friends, there is no right or wrong. It can be as simple as picturing yourself as a being of light; radiating wholeness, sharing truth, activating Will, blending colors, with all the other human souls aligned with love & light, shining together, to permeate the atmosphere with good will – illuminating the whole Earth. Short & sweet, you can do this anywhere, anytime.
Deb Safferal
If you wish to elaborate, you may want to build an imagination to help you “Think Light”. Sometimes I like to use these Steiner verses as a lead in: In purest outpoured light Shimmers the godhead of the World In purest love toward all that lives Outpours the godhood of my soul I rest within the godhead of the world There shall I find myself Within the godhead of the world (Repeat, knowing you are shimmering along with the godhead)
Iris Sullivan
Or this verse: More radiant than the sun Purer than the snow Subtler than the ether Is the Self The spirit within my heart I am that Self That Self am I
Kelly Treely
And of course our go-to verse from Waldorf Teacher & Esoteric Circle member Herbert Hahn, is the anchor for the Thought-seed for me every day:
“When I think light, my soul shines, When my soul shines, the Earth is a Star, When the Earth is a Star, then I Am, a true human being”.
in reverse: I am a True Human Being The Earth is a Star My Soul Shines I Think Light.
To extend this concept into the rest of our soul forces of Feeling & Willing, we wrote these verses to mirror Hahn’s idea.
For Feeling: When I feel warmth, my heart sings When my heart sings, the Earth resounds When the Earth resounds, I am a true I AM.
I Am a True I Am The Earth Resounds My Heart Sings I Feel Warmth
For Willing: When I will life, my hands help When my hands help, the Earth heals When the Earth heals, I Am a free human being
I Am a Free Human Being The Earth Heals My Hands Help I Will Life
Paul Carter
You might want to picture Mighty Spiritual Beings noticing our shining. Then we become a beacon which calls for a response. Powerful forces reply, by sending their protection & energy to us on Earth. Then we can work with them to collectively surround any disharmony, embracing with compassion all discord, bringing every dis-ease into the light of healing wholeness…
Every day is different; you may want to feel into the sense of what is needed, for yourself, & for the world in that moment.
Lately before saying the verse, I have been setting the stage by creating Thought-pictures using my guardian angel as an energy enhancer. I invoke the angelic presence into my thinking, inviting this being to work with me to purify my astral forces, so that I may be a fit vessel for the light. I say this Steiner verse: Spirit Triumphant Flame thru the weakness of my faint-hearted soul Consume my self-seeking Burn up my egoism Enkindle compassion That selflessness That living stream in humanity May flow as a well-spring of Spiritual Re-birth.
Mandy Parker
I also picture the guardian angels of the all of you out there shining with me.
I can continue to build circles within circles, expanding out from the human, to the angelic; & then I bring in the Archangelic forces, which I picture as Columbia, the Being of America; joining in harmony with all the other Folk Spirits of the various national cultures, going beyond borders, into the universality of our unique humanness.
Kristena West
This then opens the threshold to the Archai, The Time-Spirit who holds the zeitgeist of the Age – Michael, who beckons us to work with him & the Being of Wisdom, The Sophia, to redeem the Cosmic Intelligence.
William Blake
Of course we could keep going up the ladder of the 9 Angelic realms to build higher circles of light by rising in our thinking – all the way – to meet the godhead in the Trinity.
Daniel Holeman
And then gathering & contracting that energy back down into the Earth, & into ourselves, to empower us in our becoming – the 10th Hierarchy of Freedom & Love – And the Earth – a sacred planet, a Star – the Sun of the New Jerusalem.
How do you do 10:10?
D.P. Dyyard
~Together we create a circle of protection & light In the Christic center Which has its eternal point within our heart – Ever reflecting out to the periphery of eternal becoming. ~hag
~Stellarium
10.10.22 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Fomalhaut, somtimes called “The Autumn Star”, is by far the brightest star in its constellation Piscis Australis, and is one of the brightest stars in the night sky. The dim constellations of Aquarius and Capricorn are close by. While known as the “Loneliest Star,” you can see that Fomalhaut has two relatively close and bright visitors this year: Jupiter and Saturn!
Zodiac designed by Rudolf Steiner, and painted in 1912, on the ceiling of the Anthroposophical Center in Stuttgart. In 1937 the building was destroyed.
~Autumnal vapours hover over the magic world of sense… Within the shining pageant of the light mingles a softening veil of mist… i see afar on fields of space the wintry sleep of fall… The Summer that is gone has given Herself to my call… ~hag
Yep, the harvest season is upon us once again…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…
“When you sit in the Sukkah, ‘the shade of faithfulness,’ the Shechinah spreads Her wings over you…”
When our daughter was in 3rd grade we started celebrating Sukkot – In the Waldorf pedagogy this age is all about leaving the garden of paradise, The children live into stories about Moses & the wandering in the desert, & learn to build shelters. Her class was very close, so we had gatherings in our sukkah every year to 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 in our year- Yom Kipper, to one of the most joyous. This festival is sometimes referred to as the ‘Season of our Rejoicing’. Sukkot begins at Sunset tonight when the Full Hunters Moon starts to rise, & lasts for seven days.
The word “Sukkot” means “booths,” & refers to the temporary dwellings that we build to celebrate this holiday. The name of the holiday is 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 Hebrew People were wandering in the desert, living in temporary shelters. Sukkot is also a harvest festival, & is sometimes referred to as the ‘Festival of Ingathering’.
The Gospel of John Chapter 7 gives a powerful account of ‘The Festival of Tabernacles’:
37 On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. 38 Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” 39 By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.
40 On hearing his words, some of the people said, “Surely this man is the Prophet.”
41 Others said, “He is the Messiah.”
This is harvest time, so we decorate the sukkah with the bounty of autumn, dried 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 in the left hand. With these four species in your right 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 in the Sukkah. 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), and Esther (Book of Esther).
So come join us in spirit, with thoughts of World Peace, & be part of this experiential celebration…What great leaders, proud Matriarchs or daring Daddies would you like to invite into the sukkah…? Let this ancient tradition made new, empower you…
Blessings & Peace
~hag
RUDOLF STEINER’S CALENDAR OF THE SOUL translated (with added titles) by Roy Sadler MICHAELMAS II Soul Springtime v27 To fathom my depths of being arouses longing, ardently divining, that I, self-contemplating, find myself as gift the summer sun’s bequeathed my autumn mood in germinating seed, warm spring of strength to motivate my soul.
Karl König descibes how the spirit-germ of the self is a reflection of the Michael being, which illumined by the Sun of Christ begins to develop and grow in Christ light. “The more conscious this seed is of itself, the more graciously will the Sun of Christ shine upon it. For it is in the growing darkness of autumn and winter that the dawning of His Spirit-Sun begins. The self of man, which has now arisen, has to find it.” It is the turning point of the Soul Calendar’s year. The soul’s attention now turns inward, longing to know herself. In last week’s mirror verse a fiery Michaelic will power expressed itself.
MICHAELMAS Michaelic Firepower v26 Natura, in the being of my will I bear thy soul of motherhood and in my will enkindled firepower my spirit impulses are tempered, steeled, that feeling of the selfhood formed from them bear I in me.
This is the summer’s gift and can be compared to each night’s gift of sleep when higher beings implant a moral purpose in us. May this motivate our winter souls.
9 October 2022 – “Speaking with the Stars”: The Full Hunters Moon next to Juipter! A full moon is always opposite the sun. So all full moons rise in the east around sunset. And all full moons set in the west around sunrise. But full moons have different characteristics, mostly related to their paths across the sky. And, shortly after they rise, full moons closest to the autumnal equinox follow a path across the Northern Hemisphere sky that makes a narrow angle with respect to the eastern evening horizon. So – in the early autumn you might see a bright moon in the east shortly after sunset for several evenings in a row.
