Category Archives: History

Wisdom Calls

History, Poetry
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Lenten-Tide Day #3:

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Tula Devi

Befriend your Guardian Angel. I am often in conversation with my Angel. Right before sleep usually, when I thank, & acknowledge this being who serves me thru many lifetimes. And I also use this time to ask questions or set goals that I need help with.

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Katrina Lanfranco

I am using this time to set new rhythms.

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Sir George Clauson

The first rhythm is Rest or Peace, which for me still engages the will, it is active: playing, praying, holding reverence, wonder, gratitude & awe.

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With a focus on seeing: Christ in every human being.

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To Listen – In an age when smartphones & social media have made communication with people around the globe easier than ever, hearing that still small voice of the Divine in the midst of competing voices can often be difficult. Of course, this isn’t an entirely unique problem: Proverbs 8 describes both Wisdom & Folly crying out from the high places of the city to all who would pass by. The good news is that the gods are always speaking. The bad news is, so is are the adversarial voices.

What would it look like, to devote a designated period of time disconnected from all devices & distractions? What if you spent that time praying to more clearly hear the voice of Wisdom?

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Lupam Juniaa

Proverbs 8 – Wisdom’s Call

8 Does not wisdom call out?
    Does not understanding raise her voice?
2 At the highest point along the way,
    where the paths meet, she takes her stand;
3 beside the gate leading into the city,
    at the entrance, she cries aloud:
4 “To you, O people, I call out;
    I raise my voice to all mankind.
5 You who are simple, gain prudence;
    you who are foolish, set your hearts on it.[a]
6 Listen, for I have trustworthy things to say;
    I open my lips to speak what is right.
7 My mouth speaks what is true,
    for my lips detest wickedness.
8 All the words of my mouth are just;
    none of them is crooked or perverse.
9 To the discerning all of them are right;
    they are upright to those who have found knowledge.
10 Choose my instruction instead of silver,
    knowledge rather than choice gold,
11 for wisdom is more precious than rubies,
    and nothing you desire can compare with her.

12 “I, wisdom, dwell together with prudence;
    I possess knowledge and discretion.
13 To fear the Lord is to hate evil;
    I hate pride and arrogance,
    evil behavior and perverse speech.
14 Counsel and sound judgment are mine;
    I have insight, I have power.
15 By me kings reign
    and rulers issue decrees that are just;
16 by me princes govern,
    and nobles—all who rule on earth.[b]
17 I love those who love me,
    and those who seek me find me.
18 With me are riches and honor,
    enduring wealth and prosperity.
19 My fruit is better than fine gold;
    what I yield surpasses choice silver.
20 I walk in the way of righteousness,
    along the paths of justice,
21 bestowing a rich inheritance on those who love me
    and making their treasuries full.

22 “The Lord brought me forth as the first of his works,[c][d]
    before his deeds of old;
23 I was formed long ages ago,
    at the very beginning, when the world came to be.
24 When there were no watery depths, I was given birth,
    when there were no springs overflowing with water;
25 before the mountains were settled in place,
    before the hills, I was given birth,
26 before he made the world or its fields
    or any of the dust of the earth.
27 I was there when he set the heavens in place,
    when he marked out the horizon on the face of the deep,
28 when he established the clouds above
    and fixed securely the fountains of the deep,
29 when he gave the sea its boundary
    so the waters would not overstep his command,
and when he marked out the foundations of the earth.
30     Then I was constantly[e] at his side.
I was filled with delight day after day,
    rejoicing always in his presence,
31 rejoicing in his whole world
    and delighting in mankind.

32 “Now then, my children, listen to me;
    blessed are those who keep my ways.
33 Listen to my instruction and be wise;
    do not disregard it.
34 Blessed are those who listen to me,
    watching daily at my doors,
    waiting at my doorway.
35 For those who find me find life
    and receive favor from the Lord.
36 But those who fail to find me harm themselves;
    all who hate me love death.”

***

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Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

19 February 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: First-quarter Moon shines between Aldebaran & the Pleiades.

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY 

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Alexander Mak

1473 – Birthday of Nicolaus Copernicus, Polish mathematician & astronomer

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1807 – Former Vice President of the United States Aaron Burr is arrested for treason in Wakefield, Alabama and confined to Fort Stoddert. Aaron Burr was an American politician & lawyer. He served as the third vice president of the United States during President Thomas Jefferson’s first term from 1801 to 1805. During his last year as vice president, Burr engaged in the duel in which he fatally shot Hamilton, his political rival. Although dueling was illegal, Burr was never tried, and all charges against him eventually were dropped. Nevertheless, Hamilton’s death ended Burr’s political career.

Burr traveled west to the American frontier, seeking new economic & political opportunities. His secretive activities led to his 1807 arrest in Alabama on charges of treason. He was brought to trial more than once for what became known as the Burr conspiracy, but was acquitted each time. Nevertheless, with large debts & few influential friends, Burr left the United States to live as an expatriate in Europe. Handicapped by a stroke and financially ruined, Burr died at a boarding house in 1836.

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1878 – Thomas Edison patents the phonograph.

1884 – More than sixty tornadoes strike the Southern United States, one of the largest tornado outbreaks in U.S. history.

1899 – End of the Kali Yuga according to Elisabeth Vreeda, which began in 3001 BC.

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1899 – Birthday of Ehrenfried Pfeiffer, a German scientist, soil scientist, leading advocate of biodynamic agriculture, anthroposophist and student of Rudolf Steiner.

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1942 – President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs executive order 9066, allowing the United States military to relocate Japanese Americans to internment camps.

1953 – Book censorship in the United States: The Georgia Literature Commission is established

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1963 – The publication of Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique reawakens the feminist movement in the United States as women’s organizations and consciousness raising groups spread

***

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POD

~do you
know magic…?
can you utter the name of your soul
& bring yourSelf back to light…?
from the fruits of your labor do you know
… who you are…?
can you speak your destiny
with willful words that vibrate
to create a life full filled…?
~hag

***

Weaving a non-gendered Feminist Reality with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg*

Friday 5 March 2021 – 6:30 am – 8 am Central Time as part of the The International Youth Initiative Program Initiative Forum

What are the qualities of the Divine Feminine? How can we use them to empower an innovative way of thinking, feeling & willing, to create a new world, where the human being is free?

Have paper & colored pencils at the ready for this hands-on workshop.

*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg – Founder of Reverse Ritual: Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year & the ‘I Think Speech’ Podcast. Trans-denominational Minister, Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Anthroposopher – working as the Festivals Coordinator of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch, & the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society. Past Video Recordings

 Other presenters include:
Oland Bishop, & Helmy Abouleish
Managing Director of SEKEM

While this wasn’t exactly what we first envisioned, moving online means
that this forum will be more accessible than perhaps ever before.
The program will be designed to accommodate people from different time zones
all over the globe, and we look forward to transcending restrictions and limitations by joining together in community with folks for whom travelling is not an option.

In addition to interactive workshops, lectures, open spaces, performances & more, there will be plenty of space within the program for fostering connection
and conversation. At the Initiative Forum, we hope you will laugh a lot
(wait till you see what our arts & culture team is cooking up!), listen deeply,
be truly heard, and experience the power of community,
which no distance can dull. We can’t wait to meet you!

For tickets click here! (it’s only $30 to support these young folks)
 To stay updated follow us on Facebook or Instagram. 
The International Youth Initiative Program

***


The 8-Fold Path to the Easter Elementals

Holy Week 2021 (March 28 – April 4): Starting on Palm Sunday then thru-out Holy Week including Easter Morning, we will meet every day on Zoom at 10:10 am (Central Time) to create together a Thought-Seed Egregore based on the Herbert Hahn Verse

“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”

& then we will take turns sharing the indications for that day from Rudolf Steiner / The Buddha’s 8 –fold Path, known as the ‘Weekday Exercises’ (let me know if you would like to lead one of the days? (5 min) Holy Week  chart

Palm SUNDAY
Resolves or ‘RIGHT JUDGMENT.’ having been formed independently of sympathies and antipathies.

Holy MONDAY
Talking – ‘RIGHT WORD.’

Holy TUESDAY
External actions- ‘RIGHT DEED.’

Holy WEDNESDAY
The ordering of life. – ‘RIGHT STANDPOINT.’

Maundy THURSDAY
Human Endeavour. – ‘TO LET ALL THE EXERCISES BECOME A HABIT.’

Good FRIDAY
The endeavor to learn as much as possible from life. – ‘RIGHT MEMORY.’ (Remembering what has been learned from experiences).

Holy SATURDAY
To pay attention to one’s ideas. – ‘RIGHT OPINION.’

The octave of the New Sun
EASTER SUNDAY
To turn one’s gaze inwards –
‘RIGHT EXAMINATION.’

Whoever is holding the leading thoughts for that day will tie it into some 5-10 min. artistic exercise based on the indications

Group sharing (5 min)

We close with the ‘reversed’ Hahn verse.
I am a True Human Being
For the Earth is a Star
The Earth is a Star
When I Think Light
When I think Light
My Soul Shines

Easter Sunday – 4 April 2021, in person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago & online 2 pm – 4 pm Central Time.

Group Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Hazel Archer – The octave of the New Sun

Keynote with Ines Katharina (Bee Keeper, Founder of the Biodynamic Emerald Honeybee Sanctuary, Waldorf Teacher) Ines will connect the Easter Thought with the Elemental Beings & the flight of the Queen Bee.

Mary Ruud will give us a performance of ‘Rock Spring Wonder’

We close with singing ‘Now the green Blade Riseth’

Potluck Social Time in the Schreinerei – Please bring food & drink to share

$10 Suggested Donation (can’t make it? or joining us online? please consider supporting this event, Thank you)

*Dear friends, please join the call at 10:05 am to get settled in so we can begin the Thought-Seed promptly at 10:10 am
Topic: The 8-Fold Path thru Holy Week 2021
Time: Starting on Palm Sunday Mar 28 – thru Easter Morning, 2021 10:10 AM Central Time (US and Canada)
Every day, 8 occurrence(s)
Mar 28, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 29, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 30, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 31, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 1, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 2, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 3, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 4, 2021 10:10 AM

Daily: https://zoom.us/meeting/tJErdOqsqj8iGNzL8iNTwKUXyrvmVGSSXqaW/ics?icsToken=98tyKuCtqDgpHtCRuBuPRowMBIjCb-jwiClHjY1HsEfsLRRESTbOL_BUP4RYI-vo

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/95633444828?pwd=Wk56K08vK2dNQUhhK0Q2S09zQWJrQT09 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: bee

Dial by your location Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/aX8X3nrr3 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: 425730

Wade in…

History, Poetry, Remembering, Rudolf Steiner Quote, Speaking with the Stars

Lenten-Tide Day #2:

From Lisa Bennett: ‘Also, for your consideration: 40 is the value of the Hebrew Letter Mem – Water. Water is the “water that will not wet the hands” as opposed to the Fire that Moses saw that did not consume the Bush. John said that One would come after him Baptizing in Fire and the Holy Spirit. Also, in the Wilderness when Jesus was tempted he was tempted 3 times, and each of these temptations has a significant character to it, a specific aspect of fall that can only be remedied through what Jesus referred to in Matthew 28 “baptizing ‘in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit’. Jesus was born of the waters of his mothers’ womb, his first miracle was at a wedding and involved water. I will dive deep into the depths with you these 40 days as we await taking a breath on the other side with the Breath of Life fully filling us.’

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From Steve Hale: The Gospel of John – The Healing at Bethesda: “Now there is in Jerusalem by the sheep gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda, having five porticoes. In these lay a multitude of those who were sick, blind, lame, and withered, waiting for the moving of the waters; for an angel of the Lord went down at certain seasons into the pool and stirred up the water; whoever then first, after the stirring up of the water, stepped in was made well from whatever disease with which he was afflicted. A man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had already been a long time in that condition, He said to him, “Do you wish to get well?” The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, but while I am coming, another steps down before me.” Jesus said to him, “Get up, pick up your pallet and walk.” Immediately the man became well, and picked up his pallet and began to walk.”

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Wade in the water, wade in the water children
Wade in the water, God’s gonna trouble the water

Who’s that yonder dressed in red
Wade in water
Must be the children that Moses led
God’s gonna trouble the water

Wade in the water, wade in the water children
Wade in the water, God’s gonna trouble the water

Who’s that yonder dressed in white
Wade in the water
Must be the children of the Israelite
God’s gonna trouble the water

Wade in the water, wade in the water children
Wade in the water, God’s gonna trouble the water

Who’s that yonder dressed in blue
Wade in water
Must be the Children that’s comin’ through
God’s gonna trouble the water
God’s gonna trouble the water

Wade in the water, wade in the water children
Wade in the water, God’s gonna trouble the water

If you don’t believe I’ve been redeemed
Wade in the water
Just see the holy ghost looking for me
God’s gonna trouble the water

Wade in the water, wade in the water children
Wade in the water, God’s gonna trouble the water

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Baily Adams

My question for Day 2 of Lent 2021:

2. What habits in my life are preventing me from loving with my whole heart, & my neighbor as myself? How will I address those issues before Easter?

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Rekha Rodwittiya

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

18 February 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover lands today!?!

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY (4 interesting Deathdays)

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1535 – Deathday of Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa, German magician, astrologer, &  theologian. “  In Agrippa’s time one found, it is true, little comprehension of the “natural magic” which he advocated, and which seeks in nature the natural, and the spiritual only in the spirit; men clung to the “supernatural magic” which seeks the spiritual in the realm of the sensory, and against which Agrippa fought. This is why the Abbot Trithemius of Sponheim advised him to communicate his views as a secret doctrine only to a few chosen ones, who were able to rise to a similar conception of nature and spirit, for “one gives only hay to oxen and not sugar, as to songbirds.” It is perhaps to this abbot that Agrippa himself owes the right point of view.” ~ Mysticism at the Dawn of the Modern Age, by Rudolf Steiner

Lucas Cranach the Elder

1546 – Deathday of Martin Luther, German priest & theologian, leader of the Protestant Reformation. A piece of paper was later found on which Luther had written his last statement. The statement was in Latin, apart from “We are beggars,” which was in German. The statement reads:

No one can understand Virgil’s Bucolics unless he has been a shepherd for five years. No one can understand Virgil’s Georgics, unless he has been a farmer for five years.

No one can understand Cicero’s Letters (or so I teach), unless he has busied himself in the affairs of some prominent state for twenty years.

Know that no one can have indulged in the Holy Writers sufficiently, unless he has governed churches for a hundred years with the prophets, such as Elijah and Elisha, John the Baptist, Christ and the apostles.

Do not assail this divine Aeneid; nay, rather prostrate revere the ground that it treads.

We are beggars: this is true.

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1564 – Deathday of Michelangelo, Italian sculptor & painter. “In Michelangelo we have a spirit who helped human evolution on its way because he had a maturity of soul which enabled him to imprint on the world of space and matter significant facts from the spiritual world. He stood wholly in the great current of his times yet his own inmost quality was not fully understood. A friend once wrote to him that even the Pope feared him; and yet in his soul there lived all the greatness of Christian impulses which flowed into his work. While he felt himself at one with the great Christian impulses he yet lived at the dawn of a later epoch — closely though it was still connected with earlier ages. The content of older Christian impulses still affected his soul and out of that he created something which in its form and artistic method was already part of the ties in which we ourselves live. Hence comes the mood of the poem which he wrote — probably during his last days as he looked back over his life — and which makes it clear what our relation is to him, and how we should allow his influence over us to work:

Now hath my life across a stormy sea
like a frail barque reached that wide port where all
are hidden, ere the final reckoning fall
of good and evil for eternity.

Now know I well how that fond phantasy,
which made my soul the worshipper and thrall
of earthly art, is vain; how criminal
is that which all men seek unwillingly.

Those amorous thoughts which were so lightly dressed
what are they when the double death is nigh?
The one I know for sure, the other dread.

Painting nor sculpture now can lull to rest
my soul that turns to His great Love on high
Whose arms to clasp us on the cross were spread.” ~ from ‘Michelangelo’, A Lecture given by Rudolf Steiner, Berlin, 8th January, 1914, GA 63

Head and shoulders portrait

1967 – Deathday of J. Robert Oppenheimer, American physicist & academic. “Father of the atomic bomb” for his role in the Manhattan Project, the World War II undertaking that developed the first nuclear weapons. The first atomic bomb was detonated on July 16, 1945, in the Trinity test in New Mexico. Oppenheimer later remarked that it brought to mind words from the Bhagavad Gita: “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.” In August 1945, the weapons were used in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima & Nagasaki.

After the war ended, Oppenheimer became chairman of the influential General Advisory Committee of the newly created United States Atomic Energy Commission. He used that position to lobby for international control of nuclear power to avert nuclear proliferation and a nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union. He opposed the development of the hydrogen bomb during a 1949–50 governmental debate on the question & subsequently took stances on defense-related issues that provoked the ire of some factions in the U.S. government & military. During the Second Red Scare, those stances, led to him suffering the revocation of his security clearance in a much-written-about hearing in 1954. Effectively stripped of his direct political influence, he continued to lecture, write & work in physics.

***

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Michelangelo

POD (Poem Of the Day)

~Thought finds form
All that is forgotten returns
Transformed in the doing
This moment marks a time
Like a black obsidian
Reflecting sunlight
Into my mind’s eye
~hag

***

Weaving a non-gendered Feminist Reality with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg*

Friday 5 March 2021 – 6:30 am – 8 am Central Time as part of the The International Youth Initiative Program Initiative Forum

What are the qualities of the Divine Feminine? How can we use them to empower an innovative way of thinking, feeling & willing, to create a new world, where the human being is free?

Have paper & colored pencils at the ready for this hands-on workshop.

*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg – Founder of Reverse Ritual: Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year & the ‘I Think Speech’ Podcast. Trans-denominational Minister, Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Anthroposopher – working as the Festivals Coordinator of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch, & the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society. Past Video Recordings

 Other presenters include:
Oland Bishop, & Helmy Abouleish
Managing Director of SEKEM

While this wasn’t exactly what we first envisioned, moving online means
that this forum will be more accessible than perhaps ever before.
The program will be designed to accommodate people from different time zones
all over the globe, and we look forward to transcending restrictions and limitations by joining together in community with folks for whom travelling is not an option.

In addition to interactive workshops, lectures, open spaces, performances & more, there will be plenty of space within the program for fostering connection
and conversation. At the Initiative Forum, we hope you will laugh a lot
(wait till you see what our arts & culture team is cooking up!), listen deeply,
be truly heard, and experience the power of community,
which no distance can dull. We can’t wait to meet you!

For tickets click here! (it’s only $30 to support these young folks)
 To stay updated follow us on Facebook or Instagram. 
The International Youth Initiative Program

***


The 8-Fold Path to the Easter Elementals

Holy Week 2021 (March 28 – April 4): Starting on Palm Sunday then thru-out Holy Week including Easter Morning, we will meet every day on Zoom at 10:10 am (Central Time) to create together a Thought-Seed Egregore based on the Herbert Hahn Verse

“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”

& then we will take turns sharing the indications for that day from Rudolf Steiner / The Buddha’s 8 –fold Path, known as the ‘Weekday Exercises’ (let me know if you would like to lead one of the days? (5 min) Holy Week  chart

Palm SUNDAY
Resolves or ‘RIGHT JUDGMENT.’ having been formed independently of sympathies and antipathies.

Holy MONDAY
Talking – ‘RIGHT WORD.’

Holy TUESDAY
External actions- ‘RIGHT DEED.’

Holy WEDNESDAY
The ordering of life. – ‘RIGHT STANDPOINT.’

Maundy THURSDAY
Human Endeavour. – ‘TO LET ALL THE EXERCISES BECOME A HABIT.’

Good FRIDAY
The endeavor to learn as much as possible from life. – ‘RIGHT MEMORY.’ (Remembering what has been learned from experiences).

Holy SATURDAY
To pay attention to one’s ideas. – ‘RIGHT OPINION.’

The octave of the New Sun
EASTER SUNDAY
To turn one’s gaze inwards –
‘RIGHT EXAMINATION.’

Whoever is holding the leading thoughts for that day will tie it into some 5-10 min. artistic exercise based on the indications

Group sharing (5 min)

We close with the ‘reversed’ Hahn verse.
I am a True Human Being
For the Earth is a Star
The Earth is a Star
When I Think Light
When I think Light
My Soul Shines

Easter Sunday – 4 April 2021, in person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago & online 2 pm – 4 pm Central Time.

Group Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Hazel Archer – The octave of the New Sun

Keynote with Ines Katharina (Bee Keeper, Founder of the Biodynamic Emerald Honeybee Sanctuary, Waldorf Teacher) Ines will connect the Easter Thought with the Elemental Beings & the flight of the Queen Bee.

Mary Ruud will give us a performance of ‘Rock Spring Wonder’

We close with singing ‘Now the green Blade Riseth’

Potluck Social Time in the Schreinerei – Please bring food & drink to share

$10 Suggested Donation (can’t make it? or joining us online? please consider supporting this event, Thank you)

*Dear friends, please join the call at 10:05 am to get settled in so we can begin the Thought-Seed promptly at 10:10 am
Topic: The 8-Fold Path thru Holy Week 2021
Time: Starting on Palm Sunday Mar 28 – thru Easter Morning, 2021 10:10 AM Central Time (US and Canada)
Every day, 8 occurrence(s)
Mar 28, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 29, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 30, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 31, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 1, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 2, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 3, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 4, 2021 10:10 AM

Daily: https://zoom.us/meeting/tJErdOqsqj8iGNzL8iNTwKUXyrvmVGSSXqaW/ics?icsToken=98tyKuCtqDgpHtCRuBuPRowMBIjCb-jwiClHjY1HsEfsLRRESTbOL_BUP4RYI-vo

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/95633444828?pwd=Wk56K08vK2dNQUhhK0Q2S09zQWJrQT09 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: bee

Dial by your location Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/aX8X3nrr3 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: 425730

Her Body Electric

History, Poetry, Rudolf Steiner Quote
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On the ‘I Think Speech’ podcast: The Truth about Valentines’ Day ~According to hag

Image result for goddess is love painting
Alma Amakeki

POD (Poem Of the Day)
~All are One
In Love…
We are Her body electric,
Her Eternal Time moves in our bellies…
There is no season in which heaven is not
In earth – holding the shape of the Beloved to connect the heart & mind…
We are growing, forgiving, re-membering, forgetting, becoming
We are the many –
One face changing expression –
We are the will of Love…
~hag

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Kati Thamo

“To be a poet in a destitute time means: to attend, singing, to the trace of the fugitive gods. This is why the poet in the time of the world’s night utters the holy.”
~Martin Heidegger

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‘Why do we occupy ourselves with Spiritual Science? It is as though we were learning the vocabulary of the language through which we approach the Christ. If we take the trouble to learn to think the thoughts of Spiritual Science, and make the mental effort necessary for an understanding of the Cosmic secrets taught by Spiritual Science, then, out of the dim, dark foundations of the Cosmic mysteries, will come forth the figure of Christ Jesus, which will draw near to us and give us the strength and force in which we shall then live. The Christ will guide us, standing beside us as a brother, so that our hearts and souls may be strong enough to grow up to the necessary level of the tasks awaiting humanity in its further development.’ ~ Rudolf Steiner, Cosmic and Human Metamorphoses, Lecture 1. Materialism and Spirituality.

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Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

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1834 – Birthday of Ernst Haeckel, was also a promoter of scientific racism & embraced the idea of Social Darwinism. Haeckel was also a German zoologist, naturalist, eugenicist, philosopher, physician, professor, marine biologist, & artist who discovered, described & named thousands of new species, mapped a genealogical tree relating all life forms, & coined many terms in biology, including ecology. Haeckel promoted & popularised Charles Darwin’s work in Germany. The published artwork of Haeckel includes over 100 detailed, multi-colour illustrations of animals & sea creatures. See Haeckel, the Riddles of the World and Theosophy, by Rudolf Steiner, Berlin, 5th October 1905

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1924 –  Rudolf Steiner began the Karmic Relationships lecture today in Dornach GA 235-240

***

Weaving a non-gendered Feminist Reality with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg*

Friday 5 March 2021 – 6:30 am – 8 am Central Time as part of the The International Youth Initiative Program Initiative Forum

What are the qualities of the Divine Feminine? How can we use them to empower an innovative way of thinking, feeling & willing, to create a new world, where the human being is free?

Have paper & colored pencils at the ready for this hands-on workshop.

*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg – Founder of Reverse Ritual: Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year & the ‘I Think Speech’ Podcast. Trans-denominational Minister, Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Anthroposopher – working as the Festivals Coordinator of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch, & the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society. Past Video Recordings

 
While this wasn’t exactly what we first envisioned, moving online means
that this forum will be more accessible than perhaps ever before.
The program will be designed to accommodate people from different time zones
all over the globe, and we look forward to transcending restrictions and limitations by joining together in community with folks for whom travelling is not an option.

In addition to interactive workshops, lectures, open spaces, performances & more, there will be plenty of space within the program for fostering connection
and conversation. At the Initiative Forum, we hope you will laugh a lot
(wait till you see what our arts & culture team is cooking up!), listen deeply,
be truly heard, and experience the power of community,
which no distance can dull. We can’t wait to meet you!

For tickets click here! (it’s only $30 to support these young folks)
 To stay updated follow us on Facebook or Instagram. 
The International Youth Initiative Program

***


The 8-Fold Path to the Easter Elementals

Holy Week 2021 (March 28 – April 4): Starting on Palm Sunday then thru-out Holy Week including Easter Morning, we will meet every day on Zoom at 10:10 am (Central Time) to create together a Thought-Seed Egregore based on the Herbert Hahn Verse

“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”

& then we will take turns sharing the indications for that day from Rudolf Steiner / The Buddha’s 8 –fold Path, known as the ‘Weekday Exercises’ (let me know if you would like to lead one of the days? (5 min) Holy Week  chart

Palm SUNDAY
Resolves or ‘RIGHT JUDGMENT.’ having been formed independently of sympathies and antipathies.

Holy MONDAY
Talking – ‘RIGHT WORD.’

Holy TUESDAY
External actions- ‘RIGHT DEED.’

Holy WEDNESDAY
The ordering of life. – ‘RIGHT STANDPOINT.’

Maundy THURSDAY
Human Endeavour. – ‘TO LET ALL THE EXERCISES BECOME A HABIT.’

Good FRIDAY
The endeavor to learn as much as possible from life. – ‘RIGHT MEMORY.’ (Remembering what has been learned from experiences).

Holy SATURDAY
To pay attention to one’s ideas. – ‘RIGHT OPINION.’

The octave of the New Sun
EASTER SUNDAY
To turn one’s gaze inwards –
‘RIGHT EXAMINATION.’

Whoever is holding the leading thoughts for that day will tie it into some 5-10 min. artistic exercise based on the indications

Group sharing (5 min)

We close with the ‘reversed’ Hahn verse.
I am a True Human Being
For the Earth is a Star
The Earth is a Star
When I Think Light
When I think Light
My Soul Shines

Easter Sunday – 4 April 2021, in person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago & online 2 pm – 4 pm Central Time.

Group Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Hazel Archer – The octave of the New Sun

Keynote with Ines Katharina (Bee Keeper, Founder of the Biodynamic Emerald Honeybee Sanctuary, Waldorf Teacher) Ines will connect the Easter Thought with the Elemental Beings & the flight of the Queen Bee.

Mary Ruud will give us a performance of ‘Rock Spring Wonder’

We close with singing ‘Now the green Blade Riseth’

Potluck Social Time in the Schreinerei – Please bring food & drink to share

$10 Suggested Donation (can’t make it? or joining us online? please consider supporting this event, Thank you)

*Dear friends, please join the call at 10:05 am to get settled in so we can begin the Thought-Seed promptly at 10:10 am
Topic: The 8-Fold Path thru Holy Week 2021
Time: Starting on Palm Sunday Mar 28 – thru Easter Morning, 2021 10:10 AM Central Time (US and Canada)
Every day, 8 occurrence(s)
Mar 28, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 29, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 30, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 31, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 1, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 2, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 3, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 4, 2021 10:10 AM

Daily: https://zoom.us/meeting/tJErdOqsqj8iGNzL8iNTwKUXyrvmVGSSXqaW/ics?icsToken=98tyKuCtqDgpHtCRuBuPRowMBIjCb-jwiClHjY1HsEfsLRRESTbOL_BUP4RYI-vo

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/95633444828?pwd=Wk56K08vK2dNQUhhK0Q2S09zQWJrQT09 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: bee

Dial by your location Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/aX8X3nrr3 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: 425730

Lesson One

History, Soul to Soul
Image result for rosy cross painting

I recorded my Valentines’ Day Story on the ‘I Think Speech‘ podcast: A tale of Love as the path of Initiation

TODAY in 1924 Rudolf Steiner gave the 1st ‘First Class’ Lesson, restoring the ‘School of Spiritual Science’ as an esoteric institution in Dornach, founded out of the Spirit of Michael.

15 February 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Many know that Sirius is the brightest star visible in Earth’s night sky. But the second-brightest star – Canopus in the constellation Carina the Keel – isn’t nearly as well known. That’s because it’s located so far south on the celestial sphere. Tonight, think about – or look for – a star that northern stargazers rarely see. Because it’s so bright, Canopus is easily visible, even on a moonlit night. Northern stargazers sometimes travel south in winter, just to be able to glimpse this star.

Sirius is well known for being part of the constellation Canis Major the Greater Dog. Canopus is in the constellation Carina. This southern constellation once was part of Argo Navis, the great Ship that sailed the southern skies, until astronomers officially named the constellations in the 1930s, at which time they divided Argo into three separate constellations. Carina is Latin for the Keel, that large beam along the underside of a ship’s hull from bow to stern that gives it stability.

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

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Klimt

A Valentine Sonnet by Roy Sadler, and his translation, with added titles,
of THE SOUL CALENDAR by Rudolf Steiner

SAINT VALENTINE’S DAY, by Roy Sadler
The year turns outwards, moving between poles
around which all our lives revolve, the heart
and the sun. And here now, our warmest part,
our lovelight, heart-lit candlelight, ensouls
a new spring hope our hearts would share with all
of sunlight’s children, every bud now waiting
to unfold as we are celebrating,
imagining life’s future and its need for
our part in it. A festival may follow
an unexpected greeting. Sundown’s birdsong,
or being surprised by anything we stop for,
can offer us a meaning for tomorrow
to open with and our own selves belong,
poles reversed, world and self in heart’s love swapped.

CARNIVAL… LENT
Memory
v46
The world is threatening to numb
the soul’s own inborn force;
now, memory, companion me,
arise in radiance from depths of spirit
and in my sight enhance
the penetration of my glance
vitality of will alone sustains.

ASCENSIONTIDE
Foresight
v7
My self is threatening to flee,
drawn strongly by the world’s inviting light;
now, you, my foresight,
your dawning star in me arise,
and my divining, firmly as of right,
replace the power of thought
that in the senses’ glory leaves me.

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Image result for Gotthold Ephraim Lessing quote

1781 – Deathday of Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, a German writer, philosopher, dramatist, publicist & art critic – an outstanding representative of the Enlightenment era. His plays & theoretical writings substantially influenced the development of German literature.

“The circumstances of Lessing’s life, I may say, have always interested me to an extraordinary degree. Lessing is really the founder of the better sort of journalism, the journalism that has substance and is really out to accomplish something. Before Lessing, poets and dramatists had taken their subjects from the aristocracy. Lessing, on the other hand, is at pains to introduce bourgeois life, ordinary middle-class life, into the drama, the life concerned generally with the destinies of men as men, and not with the destinies of men in so far as they hold some position in society or the like. Purely human conflicts — that is what Lessing wanted to portray on the stage. In the course of his work he applied himself to many great problems, as for example when he tried to determine the boundaries of painting and of poetry in his Laocoon.

But the most interesting thing of all is the powerful impetus with which Lessing fought for the idea of tolerance. You need only take his Nathan the Wise and you will see at once what a foremost place this idea of tolerance has in Lessing’s mind and life. In weaving the fable of the three kings in Nathan the Wise, he wants to show how the three main religions have gone astray from their original forms and are none of them really genuine, and how one must go in search of the true form, which has been lost. Here we have tolerance united with an uncommonly deep and significant idea…

We begin to get an impression of Lessing when we observe, shall I say, the driving force with which he hurls his sentences against his opponents. He wages a polemic against the civilisation of Middle Europe — quite a refined and correct polemic, but at every turn hitting straight home. You must here observe a peculiar nuance in Lessing’s character if you want to understand the make-up of his life. On the one hand we have the sharpness, often caustic sharpness, in such writings as The Dramatic Art of Hamburg, and then we have to find the way over, as it were, to an understanding, for example, of the words used by Lessing when a son had been born to him and had died directly after birth. He writes somewhat as follows in a letter: Yes, he has at once taken leave again of this world of sorrow; he has thereby done the best thing a human being can do. (I cannot cite the passage word for word, but it was to this effect.) In so writing, Lessing is giving expression to his pain in a wonderfully brave way, not for that reason feeling the pain one whit less deeply than someone who can do nothing but bemoan the event. This ability to draw back into himself in pain was characteristic of the man who at the same time knew how to thrust forward with vigour when he was developing his polemics. This is what makes it so affecting to read the letter written when his child had died immediately after birth, leaving the mother seriously ill.

Lessing had moreover this remarkable thing in his destiny — and it is quite characteristic, when one sets out to find the karmic connections in his case — that he was friends in Berlin with a man who was in every particular his opposite, namely, Nikolai.

Of Lessing it can be said — it is not literally true, but it is none the less characteristic — that he never dreamed, because his intellect and his understanding were so keen. On this account, as we shall see tomorrow, he is for the spiritual researcher such an extraordinarily significant personality. But there is something in the very construction of his sentences, something in the home-thrusts with which he lays his opponent in the dust, that really makes every sentence a delight to read.

With Nikolai it is just the opposite. Nikolai is an example of a true philistine. Although a friend of Lessing, he was none the less a typical philistine-bourgeois; and he had visions, most strange and remarkable visions.

Lessing, genius as he was, had no visions, not even dreams. Nikolai literally suffered from visions. They came, and they went away only after leeches had been applied. Yes, in extremity they actually applied leeches to him, in order that he might not be for ever tormented by the spiritual world which would not let him alone…

At the close of his life Lessing wrote the remarkable essay, The Education of the Human Race, at the end of which, quite isolated, as it were, the idea of repeated earth-lives appears. The book shows how mankind goes through one epoch of development after another, and how the Gods gave into man’s hand as a first primer, so to speak, the Old Testament, and then as a second primer the New Testament, and how in the future a third book will come for the further education of the human race. And then all at once the essay is brought to a close with a brief presentation of the idea that man lives through repeated earth-lives. And there Lessing says, again in a way that is absolutely in accord with his character (I am not quoting the actual words, but this is the gist of it): Ought the idea of repeated earth-lives to seem so absurd, considering that it was present in very early times, when men had not yet been spoilt by school learning? The essay then ends with a genuine panegyric on repeated earth-lives, finishing with these beautiful words: “Is not all Eternity mine?” ~ Rudolf Steiner, Karmic Relationships: Volume 1, Lecture 11

***

Weaving a non-gendered Feminist Reality with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg*

Friday 5 March 2021 – 6:30 am – 8 am Central Time as part of the The International Youth Initiative Program Initiative Forum

What are the qualities of the Divine Feminine? How can we use them to empower an innovative way of thinking, feeling & willing, to create a new world, where the human being is free?

Have paper & colored pencils at the ready for this hands-on workshop.

*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg – Founder of Reverse Ritual: Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year & the ‘I Think Speech’ Podcast. Trans-denominational Minister, Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Anthroposopher – working as the Festivals Coordinator of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch, & the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society. Past Video Recordings

 
While this wasn’t exactly what we first envisioned, moving online means
that this forum will be more accessible than perhaps ever before.
The program will be designed to accommodate people from different time zones
all over the globe, and we look forward to transcending restrictions and limitations by joining together in community with folks for whom travelling is not an option.

In addition to interactive workshops, lectures, open spaces, performances & more, there will be plenty of space within the program for fostering connection
and conversation. At the Initiative Forum, we hope you will laugh a lot
(wait till you see what our arts & culture team is cooking up!), listen deeply,
be truly heard, and experience the power of community,
which no distance can dull. We can’t wait to meet you!

For tickets click here! (it’s only $30 to support these young folks)
 To stay updated follow us on Facebook or Instagram. 
The International Youth Initiative Program

***


The 8-Fold Path to the Easter Elementals

Holy Week 2021 (March 28 – April 4): Starting on Palm Sunday then thru-out Holy Week including Easter Morning, we will meet every day on Zoom at 10:10 am (Central Time) to create together a Thought-Seed Egregore based on the Herbert Hahn Verse

“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”

& then we will take turns sharing the indications for that day from Rudolf Steiner / The Buddha’s 8 –fold Path, known as the ‘Weekday Exercises’ (let me know if you would like to lead one of the days? (5 min) Holy Week  chart

Palm SUNDAY
Resolves or ‘RIGHT JUDGMENT.’ having been formed independently of sympathies and antipathies.

Holy MONDAY
Talking – ‘RIGHT WORD.’

Holy TUESDAY
External actions- ‘RIGHT DEED.’

Holy WEDNESDAY
The ordering of life. – ‘RIGHT STANDPOINT.’

Maundy THURSDAY
Human Endeavour. – ‘TO LET ALL THE EXERCISES BECOME A HABIT.’

Good FRIDAY
The endeavor to learn as much as possible from life. – ‘RIGHT MEMORY.’ (Remembering what has been learned from experiences).

Holy SATURDAY
To pay attention to one’s ideas. – ‘RIGHT OPINION.’

The octave of the New Sun
EASTER SUNDAY
To turn one’s gaze inwards –
‘RIGHT EXAMINATION.’

Whoever is holding the leading thoughts for that day will tie it into some 5-10 min. artistic exercise based on the indications

Group sharing (5 min)

We close with the ‘reversed’ Hahn verse.
I am a True Human Being
For the Earth is a Star
The Earth is a Star
When I Think Light
When I think Light
My Soul Shines

Easter Sunday – 4 April 2021, in person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago & online 2 pm – 4 pm Central Time.

Group Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Hazel Archer – The octave of the New Sun

Keynote with Ines Katharina (Bee Keeper, Founder of the Biodynamic Emerald Honeybee Sanctuary, Waldorf Teacher) Ines will connect the Easter Thought with the Elemental Beings & the flight of the Queen Bee.

Mary Ruud will give us a performance of ‘Rock Spring Wonder’

We close with singing ‘Now the green Blade Riseth’

Potluck Social Time in the Schreinerei – Please bring food & drink to share

$10 Suggested Donation (can’t make it? or joining us online? please consider supporting this event, Thank you)

*Dear friends, please join the call at 10:05 am to get settled in so we can begin the Thought-Seed promptly at 10:10 am
Topic: The 8-Fold Path thru Holy Week 2021
Time: Starting on Palm Sunday Mar 28 – thru Easter Morning, 2021 10:10 AM Central Time (US and Canada)
Every day, 8 occurrence(s)
Mar 28, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 29, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 30, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 31, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 1, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 2, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 3, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 4, 2021 10:10 AM

Daily: https://zoom.us/meeting/tJErdOqsqj8iGNzL8iNTwKUXyrvmVGSSXqaW/ics?icsToken=98tyKuCtqDgpHtCRuBuPRowMBIjCb-jwiClHjY1HsEfsLRRESTbOL_BUP4RYI-vo

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/95633444828?pwd=Wk56K08vK2dNQUhhK0Q2S09zQWJrQT09 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: bee

Dial by your location Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/aX8X3nrr3 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: 425730

Burn-Birth

History, Insight, Poetry, Rudolf Steiner Quote
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10:10 Testament: an affirmation from ‘The Influence of Spiritual Beings on the Human Being’ ~Rudolf Steiner, Lecture 2, January 27, 1908

Image result for zodiac painting

“What has been achieved in a planetary existence and has become sun, ascends to “heavenly” existence and becomes zodiacal existence.

And having reached zodiacal existence, what does it do? It offers itself in sacrifice! Please take account of this particular word. The first dawn-condition of the Earth, ancient Saturn, arose in a mysterious way as the result of sacrifice on the part of the Zodiac. The forces which caused the first, rarefied Saturn-masses to gather together were those which streamed down from the Zodiac, producing on Saturn the first germinal inception of physical man. This continued without cessation. You must not picture it as happening only once. Fundamentally speaking, what is happening continuously is that within what we call a planetary system the forces which evolved to a higher stage after having themselves passed through a planetary system, are sacrificed.

Image result for sun painting
Zoran Chikovik

We can say in effect: what is at first contained in a planetary system evolves to a “sun” existence, then to zodiacal existence and then has the power to be itself creative, to offer itself in sacrifice within a planetary existence.

The forces from the Zodiac “rain” down continuously into the planetary existence and continuously ascend again; for that which at one time became our Zodiac must gradually ascend again. The distribution of forces in our earth existence may be conceived as follows: — on the one side forces are descending from the Zodiac and, on the other, forces are ascending to the Zodiac. Such is the mysterious interplay between the Zodiac and our earth. Forces descend and forces ascend. This is the mysterious “heavenly ladder” upon which forces are descending and ascending. These forces are indicated in various ways in the different scriptures; you find them indicated, too, in Goethe’s Faust:

“What heavenly forces up and down are ranging, The golden vessels interchanging.”

Image result for aqariuos tarot card

As far as our human understanding goes, these forces began to descend during the Saturn-existence of our Earth and when the Earth-existence proper had reached its middle point, the stage had arrived when they gradually began again to ascend. We have now passed beyond the middle point of our evolution, which fell in the middle of the Atlantean epoch; and what human beings have lived through since then is a phase of existence beyond the middle point. In a certain sense, therefore, we may say that at the present time, more forces are ascending to the Zodiac than are descending from it…

Image result for temprence tarot card

In this way you will realize that there is interaction between everything in cosmic space, that everything in cosmic space is interconnected, inter-related. But it must never be forgotten that these operations and activities are going on all the time, that they are ever-present. At any given moment in our evolution we can therefore speak of forces which are going forth from man and forces which are coming in; forces are descending and forces are ascending. For all and each of these forces there comes, at some point, the moment when from being descending forces they are transformed into ascending forces. All forces which eventually become ascending forces are at first descending forces. They descend, so to say, as far as man. In man they acquire the power to ascend.”

***

Image result for hive Hexagon painting

POD (Poem Of the day)

~My roots thickening
Tether me like a kite –
That I may Rise with the Sap…
In the Hexagonal Snow Swirl
Formula Becomes Motion
Come sit with the Crescent Moon
Sharing the Sun Rise,
Together We Sing into the Seven Stars…
Beyond the false history of men
Beyond numbers & letters that bind them
I go Home where
My Thought Becomes Word, Becomes Memory, Becomes
The Seed that Becomes Me.
~hag

***

6 February 2021 – Speaking with the Stars”: During early dawn today & Sunday, spot the waning crescent Moon in the Southeast, with Antares to her lower right…Bella Luna steps down over Scorpius at dawn, as she nears her new-moon rendezvous with the Sun that will end her current cycle.

Image result for Winter Hexagon february 2021

The sky’s biggest asterism is the Winter Hexagon. It fills the sky toward the east & south these evenings. Start with brilliant Sirius at its bottom. Going clockwise from there, march up through Procyon, Pollux & Castor, then Menkalinan & Capella on high, down to Aldebaran, then to Rigel in Orion’s foot, & back to Sirius. Betelgeuse shines inside the Hexagon, well off center.

***

Image result for sun offering painting
Thomas Jackson

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Image result for Burning of the Temple of Diana at Ephesus AND the Birthday of Alexander the Great
Alexander the Great mosaic.jpg

356 -The Burning of the Temple of Diana at Ephesus AND the Birthday of Alexander the Great

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1347 – Birthday of Dorothea of Montau, the guardian of the country of the Teutonic Knights & patron saint of Prussia. Born to a wealthy farmer from Holland, she was married at the age of 16 to the swordsmith Adalbrecht of Danzig (Gdańsk), an ill-tempered man in his 40s. Almost immediately after marrying she began to experience visions. Her husband had little patience with her spiritual experiences & abused her. Later, both made pilgrimages to Cologne, Aachen, & Einsiedeln. While Dorothea, with her husband’s permission, was on pilgrimage to Rome, he died in 1389. Of their nine children eight died. The surviving daughter, Gertrud, joined the Benedictines. In the summer of 1391 Dorothea moved to Marienwerder (Kwidzyn), & with the blessing of the Teutonic Order, established a hermit’s cell against the wall of the cathedral. She never left that cell for the rest of her life. Dorothea led a very austere life. Numerous visitors sought her advice & consolation, & she had visions & revelations

Image result for 1778 - American Revolutionary War: In Paris the Treaty of Alliance & the Treaty of Amity are signed

1778 – American Revolutionary War: In Paris the Treaty of Alliance & the Treaty of Amity are signed by the United States & France signaling official recognition of the new republic.

Image result for Adam Weishaupt

1748 – Birthday of Adam Weishaupt, German philosopher & founder of the Illuminati. After Pope Clement XIV’s suppression of the Society of Jesus in 1773, Weishaupt became a professor of canon law, a position that was held exclusively by the Jesuits until that time. In 1775 Weishaupt was introduced to the empirical philosophy of Johann Georg Heinrich Fede. Both Feder &Weishaupt would later become opponents of Kantian idealism.

“At a time, however, when there was no end of making game of and abusing secret societies, I planned to make use of this human foible for a real and worthy goal, for the benefit of people. I wished to do what the heads of the ecclesiastical and secular authorities ought to have done by virtue of their offices…” ~ Adam Weishaupt

On 1 May 1776 Weishaupt founded the “Illuminati” in the Electorate of Bavaria. He adopted the name of “Brother Spartacus” within the order. The character of the society was an elaborate network of spies & counter-spies. Each isolated cell of initiates reported to a superior, whom they did not know: a party structure that was effectively adopted by some later groups.

Weishaupt was initiated into the Masonic Lodge “Theodor zum guten Rath“, at Munich in 1777. His project of “illumination, enlightening the understanding by the sun of reason, which will dispel the clouds of superstition and of prejudice” was an unwelcome reform. He used Freemasonry to recruit for his own quasi-masonic society, with the goal of “perfecting human nature” through re-education to achieve a communal state with nature, freed of government & organized religion. Presenting their own system as pure masonry, Weishaupt & Adolph Freiherr Knigge, who organized his ritual structure, greatly expanded the secret organization.

Weishaupt’s character & intentions have been variously assessed: from those such as the Abbé Barruel & John Robison who regarded him as a ‘human devil’ & saw his mission as one of malevolent destructiveness, to those who view him as a humane & benign, albeit willful, social reformer. Writing on this topic, Dr. Tony Page comments: “Weishaupt’s plan was to educate Illuminati followers in the highest levels of humanity and morality (basing his teachings on the supremacy of Reason, allied with the spirit of the Golden Rule of not doing to others what one would not wish done to oneself), so that if Illuminati alumni subsequently attained positions of significance and power (such as in the fields of education and politics), they could exert a benevolent and uplifting influence upon society at large. His project was utopian and naively optimistic, and he himself was certainly not without flaws of character – but neither he nor his plan was evil or violent in and of themselves. It is one of the deplorable and tragic ironies of history that a man who tried to inculcate virtue, philanthropy, social justice and morality has become one of the great hate-figures of 21st-century ‘conspiracy’ thinking.”

After Weishaupt was exiled, he received the assistance of Duke Ernest II of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg & lived in Gotha writing a series of works on illuminism, including A Complete History of the Persecutions of the Illuminati in Bavaria (1785), A Picture of Illuminism (1786), An Apology for the Illuminati (1786), & An Improved System of Illuminism (1787).

After Weishaupt’s Order of Illuminati was banned & its members dispersed, it left behind no enduring traces of an influence, not even on its own former members, who went on in the future to develop in quite different directions.

File: Walter Johannes Stein.jpg

1891 – Birthday of Walter Johannes Stein. Stein grew up in Vienna as the son of a lawyer & a Theosophist . He studied mathematics, physics & philosophy in Vienna & received his doctorate there in 1918 with a dissertation entitled Historical-Critical Contributions to the Development of Modern Philosophy , which he had developed with the help of Rudolf Steiner . He had previously participated in the First World War as an artillery officer .

In the same year he married & campaigned for the threefolding of the social organism with writings & lectures . After their failure, he was appointed to teach German & history at the first Waldorf school in Stuttgart. To this end, he was committed to the Anthroposophical Society in Germany, from 1923 to 1928 as a board member.

In 1932 he left the Waldorf School & moved to England to work for Daniel Nicol Dunlop’s research office at the World Energy Council, founded in 1924 . After his death in 1935 he published the monthly The Present Age until the beginning of World War II .

During the war he began to work as a non-medical practitioner – he had been involved in medicine since around 1920, he was also close friends with the anthroposophical doctor Ita Wegman & his school friend Eugen Kolisko in Vienna – and held public lectures on medicine until his death in 1957 & worked on a book on the basics & perspectives of spiritually advanced medicine.

***